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XXXIV. SLEEP : Its Physiology, Pathology, Hygiene, and
Psychology. By Marie de Manaceine (St. Petersburg).
Illustrated. Shortly.

THE CONTEMPORARY SCIENCE SERIES.

Edited by HAVELOCK ELLIS.

SLEEP; ITS PHYSIOLOGY, PATHOLOGY,
HYGIENE, AND PSYCHOLOGY.

SLEEP;

ITS PHYSIOLOGY, PATHOLOGY,
HYGIENE, AND PSYCHOLOGY.

MARIE DE MANACEINE

(ST. PETERSBURG).

ILLUSTRATED.

LONDON:

WALTER SCOTT, LTD., PATERNOSTER SQUARE.

1897.

30 33 33

3 a ^"93

WELLCOME INSTITUTE
LIBRARY

Coll.

welMOmec

Call

No.

—

■ CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

PAGE

The Physiology of Sleep ... ... ... ... i

The love of the Miraculous — Dreams as Suggestions of good
or evil Spirits — Comparatively little attention given to the
Scientific Study of Sleep — Changes in the Respiration during
Sleep — Variations in volume of different parts of the body — •

The Pulse slackens during Sleep — Dilatation of the Surface
Vessels — Contraction of the Vessels of the Brain — Increase of
Perspiration during Sleep — Digestion and the Activity of the
Internal Organs — State of the Blood during Sleep — State of
the Peripheral Nervous System and of the Spinal Cord — State
of the Muscular System and the Motor Nerves — Why it is
possible to awake at any moment — Determination of the
depth of Sleep — State of the Brain during Sleep — State of
Will and Attention — Condition of the Pupils and of the Visual
Axes — Why we close our Eyes in Sleep — Localising Theories
of Sleep — The Vasomotor Theory of Sleep — Chemical Theories
of Sleep — Histological Theories of Sleep — Defects of the Chief
Theories — Yawning — The Psycho- Physiological Theory of
Sleep — Sleep in Children and in Savages — Absence of Sleep
in animals deprived of Brain — Caspar Hauser — Sleep in old
age — Sleep regarded as a useless or injurious habit — Experi-
ments on prolonged absence of Sleep in Animals — In Man —
Sleep is the resting-time of Consciousness.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER II.

The Pati-iology of Sleep

Brief and Inleimiltenl Sleep — Complete Insomnia — The
Conditions of Insomnia — Afflux of Blood to the Brain-
Insomnia among the Anaemic — Unconsciousness excludes
Insomnia — Division of Consciousness causes Insomnia —
Stimulation of Consciousness as a cause of Insomnia — Why
Pains and Neuralgias disappear during Sleep — Hypnotics
and Anaesthetics — Syncope — Excessive tendency to Sleep —
Part played by the Sensations — Influence of Day and Night
in Inanition — Hibernation — Summer Sleep — Narcolepsy —
Endemic Narcolepsy in Africa — Metabolism weakened in
Narcolepsy — Enfeeblement of Sensibility — The Cataleptic
State — Napoleon’s Fits of Narcolepsy — Treatment of Narco-
lepsy— Absence of Dreams during the Narcoleptic Sleep —
The frequency of Convulsive Disorders during Sleep — Auto-
matism— Consciousness and Attention — Injurious influence of
Prolonged and Monotonous Occupations — Heightened Reflex
Activity — Automatism — Suggestion and Psychic Epidemics —
Latah — Hypnosis a pathological form of Sleep — Somnam-
bulism— State of the Sensory Organs during Somnambulism —
Hysterical Somnolence — Double Personality — Its possible
Explanation — The Theory of the Double Brain.

CHAPTER III.

The Hygiene of Sleep ... i

How much Sleep is necessary? — Lowering of the Body Tem-
perature under the Influence of Swinging — Conditions deter-
mining an increase of Sleep in Old Age — The Effect of Habit
on Sleep — The injurious Effects of Excessive Sleep — Tempor-
ary Albuminuria caused by Prolonged Sleep — Nocturnal
Paralysis — The Conditions favourable to the Development of
Anaemia — Infants at the breast should not Sleep too long —

CONTENTS.

Vil

PAGE

Methods of combating the excessive Tendency to Sleep —
Methods of combating the Tendency to Insomnia— Hot
baths— The Application of Cold Water to the Head— Supper
— Injurious Effects of burdening Digestion — The Influence of
Light— The Effects of Darkness — Why Darkness is feared —

The Temperature of the Bedroom— The Effects of Impure
Air — The Position of the Body during Sleep — The Hour for
Rising — Ventilation and Sunlight — The Habit of Breathing
through the Mouth — Sudden starts in Sleep — Dreams of
falling or flying — Sleep during Illness — The Sleep of Con-
sumptives— Sleep in Cardiac Affections — The Influence of
Tobacco — The Hypnagogic State.

CHAPTER IV.

The Psychology of Sleep ... 229

In Sleep each enters his own Psychic World — The Inde-
pendent Life of the Nervous and Cerebral Centres — Sub-
jective Visual Images — Hypnagogic phenomena — Subjective
Auditory Images — Presentation Dreams and Representation
Dreams — Part played by the various Sense Organs in Dreams
— Sight, Blearing, Touch, Taste, Smell, etc. — Visceral Organs
and Coensesthesia in Dreaming — The Muscular Sense in
Dreams — Failure of Movement in Dreams — The Emotions
in Dreams — Dreaming is associated with Intellectual Develop-
ment— The Speech Element in Dreams — Positive and Nega-
tive Images left by Dream Forms — Causality in Dreaming —
Dreaming in relation to Insanity — The Analogy of Alcoholic
Insanity to Dreaming — Morbid Dreams — Prodromic Dreams
— Dreams as Symptoms of Disease — Nightmare — The Dreams
of the Blind — The Dreams of Persons with Amputated Limbs
— The Dreams of Criminals — The Utility of Dreams — The
Significance of Dreaming.

NOTE.

The English edition of this work (already published in
Russian and in French) has been enlarged and revised by
the author. For various additions and references she is
indebted to the Editor.

Sleep.

CHAPTER I.

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF SLEEP.

The love of, the Miraculous — Dreams as Suggesiions of good
or evil Spirits — Comparatively little attentio7i given to the
Scmitifc Study of Sleep — Changes in the Resph-ation
during Sleep — Variatio7is m volume of differ e7it parts of
the body — The Pulse slackens durmg Sleep — Dilatatio7i of
the Surface Vessels — Co7itractio7i of the Vessels of the
B7'am — Increase of Perspiratio7i durmg Sleep — Digestio7i
a7id the A ctivity of the hiternal 07gans — State of the Blood
during Sleep — State of the Pc7dpheral Nervous Syste77i a7id
of the Spinal Cord — State of the Muscular Systc7n a7id the
Motor Nerves — Why it is possible to awake at any 7no7nent
— Deter7nination of the depth of Sleep — State of the Brain
du7ing Sleep — State of VVill and Attentio7i — Conditio7i of
the Pupils and of the Visual Axes — Why we close our Eyes
m Sleep — Localising Theories of Sleep — The Vaso7notor
Theory of Sleep — Che/7iical Theories of Sleep — Histological
Theories of Sleep — Defects of the Chief Theories— Yawning
— The Psycho-Physiological Theo7y of Sleep — Sleep in
Children and in Savages — Abse7ice of Sleep in animals
deprived of Brain — Caspar Hauser — Sleep m old age —
Sleep regarded as a useless or mju) ious habit — Experiments
071 p7olo7iged absence of Sleep m A7iii7ials — hi Matt —
Sleep is the restmg-time of Consciousttess, i

E all love life, and we all wish to live as long

as possible ; yet the third part of our lives,
and sometimes even the half, we give up to sleep.
“Why try to prolong life if so much of it is to be

SLEEP.

spent asleep ? ” is a question long since asked by
Kant, who advised early rising and a decrease of the
hours devoted to sleep.

What, then, is sleep? In what respects does a
sleeping man differ from a waking man? Such are
the questions we shall here have to consider.

It would be difficult to find any aspect of life
towards which so much injustice and ingratitude
have been shown as towards sleep, for not only do
we profit continually by all the benefits of sleep,
but even abuse them. Yet we pay no attention to
its phenomena, and do not even include it among
the questions deserving of serious study. It is
sufficient to observe what passes around 'us every
day in order to convince ourselves that while ordinary
people, as well as men of science, find the time and
the will to study, more or less seriously, abnormal
psychic phenomena, such as so-called thought-reading,
the alleged somnambulistic transference of visual
capacity to the finger-tips and of hearing to the
stomach, together with the pseudo-miracles of
spiritualism, yet with few exceptions they do not
think it necessary to devote themselves to the allied
study of sleep and its causes ; though, as Macario
many years ago remarked, “ there is no more
interesting subject of study, for it concerns the
highest questions of physiology, hygiene, patholog}’,
and psychology.”^

If we pay no attention to sleep, we thereby
admit that a third part of our lives is unworthy of
investigation. It is evident that sleep, constituting
a considerable and strictly defined part of life, must
have an intimate and constant relation to life, so that
^ Macario, Du Sommeil, etc., 1857.

THE PROBLEMS OF SLEEP.

many details of waking life cannot be understood
until the phenomena of sleep are explained and
understood.

In the following pages we shall frequently have
occasion to recognise the truth of this statement, for
there are many questions which the insufficient data
yet at our command do not enable us to answer.

The fact is that, although the problems of sleep
have exercised some of the greatest intellects of
ancient and modern times from Aristotle downwards,
all that we really know of sleep is due to the labours
of a comparatively small number of workers, and it
is necessary to warn the reader beforehand that in
the course of this investigation we shall often be
forced to content ourselves with somewhat barren
and incomplete explanations. This is inevitable.
We usually grow enthusiastic over the things that
shine in the inaccessible distance, everything that
is marvellous and improbable. We scarcely remark
the marvels that are spread around us and within
us, although on a just appreciation of these depends
in large part not only our own health, but also
the comfort and happiness of others. We do not
remark these things, while we give ourselves much
trouble and expend much energy in demonstrating
the possibility of phenomena in direct opposition
to the recognised laws of nature. Thus every one
knows with what admirable patience our con-
temporaries sit in dark rooms in the expectation
of mysterious noises and strange events, the raising
of tables and chairs, or the materialisation of invisible
beings belonging to the world of spirits, with other
phenomena of the same order. But although we
devote so much study to these matters, the pheno-

SLEEP.

mena of normal sleep in this nineteenth century are
still so little studied that we do not yet know how to
modify the conditions of sleep in accordance with
different diseases, or the exhaustion of the various
organs, or the changes in daily life.

Only from one point of view has sleep notably
attracted the attention of men. In dreams men
have seen a method of predicting the future; they
have cherished the faith that such visions foreshadow
events hidden from mortal eyes by the impenetrable
veil of futurity. In the most remote times a peculiar
and prophetic meaning has been sought in dreams.
Throughout classic literature also — in Homer’s Iliad,
in Virgil’s ^neid, in Ovid’s Metavioi'pJioses — we find
the record of prophetic dreams. It is so also in
medieeval literature. These tendencies and attempts
have continued with remarkable persistence to our
own days, not only among the general population but
also among the higher classes. Of this the numerous
and often reprinted books on the interpretation of
dreams, as well as the attempts we may often hear in
conversation to find a prophetic meaning in dreams,
furnish sufficient evidence.

It is among facts of this order that we may find
the first glimmer of the idea of “ suggestion,” which
has now given rise to a whole literature. In attribut-
ing to dreams a prophetic significance, men regard
them as the “ suggestions ” of good or evil spirits.
This idea, as it developed, has given rise to a more or
less regular system which has, as it were, left deep
marks on the neuro-cerebral system of humanity. At
the end of this nineteenth century, so proud of its
civilisation, this idea of suggestion, transmitted by
our ancestors in a latent state, has suddenly revived

DREAMS AND THE MIRACULOUS. 5

and now imposes itself on the attention of men* of
science. A strange literature has arisen which seeks
to show that by suggestion employed in the hypnotic
s' ate all diseases may be cured or alleviated, that the
lazy may be made diligent, the honest criminal, and
the vicious and criminal good and honest. It is
a remarkable phenomenon, and deserves serious

attention.

In expressing this opinion I have in mind, not the
theory of suggestion, but the fact that, owing to the
lav/s of heredity or tradition, the thoughts and beliefs
of our ancestors may revive in us and take on new
forms better adapted for the conditions, of modern
life and contemporary science, hacts of this kind
recall to mind the saying of Goethe, that each of us
really exhibits very little originality, very few qualities
that are really personal, for most of our qualities and
characteristic traits are but modifications of the quali-
ties and traits of this or that ancestor.^

Tylor has shown that the familiar objects of our
dwellings, the ordinary ornaments of our furniture
and houses, our children’s games, preserve the traces
of beliefs, customs, and religious rites which once
flourished on the earth and have since been forgotten,

1 “ Vom Vater hab’ ich die Statur,

Des Lebens ernstes Fiihren,

Von Miilterchen die Frohnalur
Und Lust zu fabuliren.

Urahnherr war der Schonsten hold,

Das spukt so hin und wieder ;

Urahnfrau liebte Schmuck und Gold,

Das zuckt wohl durch die Glieder.

Sind nun die Elemente nicht
Aus dem Complex zu Irennen,

Was ist denn an dem ganzen Wicht
Original zu nennen?”

SLEEP.

lost ill the dust of ages. Ihese beliefs and customs
and rites have not really disappeared ; they live and
sui round us in our dwellings, and greet us in our
children s games. And just as our material environ-
ment preserves traces of these faiths and opinions
which once caused men’s hearts to beat with hope
or joy or sorrow, so our souls preserve traces of the
thoughts and emotions which once lived and fer-
mented in the brains of our ancestors. The man of
to-day is in a manner the echo of his ancestors, and
the vibrations of his soul are often the response to
something that vibrated of old in the grey distance of
a dozen centuries.

Generations of men live and disappear as the snow
disappears, but their qualities and their thoughts, the
ideas they elaborated and the thoughts they conquered
are not engulfed in the all-engulfing abyss of time.
“All that is repeats what was,” sings a Russian poet
(OgarefQ, and we ourselves are but the repetitions of
those who preceded us.

“ Mais oil sont les neiges d’antan?” sadly asked
the old French poet. “The snows of yester-year”
have disappeared like our ancestors, but they are
born anew in the snows of to-day, just as contem-
porary generations often reflect and renew the
beliefs and ideas of our ancestors.

I have remarked that men are only interested in
sleep in so far as it satisfies their love of the
marvellous and their longing to divine the future.
Among us in Russia this tendency is even reflected
in the language, so that we employ the word son
(sleep) also to designate dreams, although to designate
these the Russian language possesses another word
{snoividenja). It is evident that if we have acquired

THE PHENOMENA OF ST,EEP.

the habit of using the word son, which designates a
general state of the organism, to express a partial
phenomenon of that state, it is only because that
partial phenomenon is considered the most important
and interesting part of the general state.

First of all I will endeavour to state as precisely as
possible the differences between the waking and the
sleeping states. ‘

It is common to compare sleep and death ; we
often call Sleep the brother of Death. But however
picturesque it may be, this comparison cannot be
seriously justified. By death we mean a complete
arrest of all the bodily functions, both of the psychic
and also -of the vegetative life ; while during sleep the
vegetative functions are' not interrupted, and only
a few of the psychic functions suspended, the rest
continuing to act with more or less modification.

The General Phenomena of Sleep. — When we fall
asleep the eyelids are lowered over the eye-balls,
which turn upwards, and the voluntary muscles are
relaxed, so that the whole body, and especially the
face, presents a picture of complete repose. At the
same time the respiration is more or less modified ; it
becomes slower and, according to Mosso’s observa-
tions, the amount of inspired air is considerably
diminished, so that instead of seven litres a sleeping
man often inspires only one litre. The respiratory
act also changes its character ; while during the
waking state abdominal respiration usually predomi-
nates in man, during sleep thoracic or costal respira-
tion predominates. Sleep produces a weakening of
the action of the diaphragm, according to Mosso;^
at the same time inspiration is more prolonged than

^ Archiv, fiir Physiologie, 1878.

SLEEP.

during the waking state, occupying ten-twelfths of
the respiratory period, instead of eight-twelfths. The
lespiratory pause is absent during sleep, and the
depth of respiration considerably diminished.

The foregoing observations apply to men. The
changes that take place in the respiration of women,
which in the waking condition is usually costal
rather than abdominal, have not been observed.
The same ignorance prevails in respect to children.

The investigations of Voit and Pettenkoffer from
one side,^ and those of Scharling from the other, ^
have shown that sleep modifies the entire character
of the gaseous exchange in the body; there is a
decrease in the quantity of carbonic acid eliminated
— 42 per cent, by night as against 58 per cent, by
day, according to Pettenkoffer and Voit — and an
increased absorption of oxygen. It must be added
that the elimination of carbonic acid depends on
other factors besides sleep : the darkness, the absence
of muscular exercise, the period at which food was
ingested, and the amount taken. Henneberg’s experi-
ments on animals (bullocks and sheep) show that
under the influence of inanition there is a consider-
able diminution in the elimination of carbonic acid
during the night, while it is increased, especially at
night, when the animals receive their ordinary food.
Since the investigations of Regnault and Reiset^ it
has also become clear that even the quality of the
food influences the gaseous exchange, asleep as well
as awake. When animals are given meat, i.e. albu-
minous nourishment, they eliminate 79 per cent, of

1 SitzungsbericlUe d. konigl, buyer. Acad,, 1866-67.

2 Annalen d. Chem, n, Pharm., 1843.

^ Anna/es de Chimie et de Physique, 1863.

TEMPERATURE DURING SLEEP

7 9 II M. IRM. 3 5 7 9 II IAJV1.

Temperature curves by different observers; * indicates a meal (Landois).

SLEEP.

the inspired oxygen in the form of carbonic acid ;
while when fed on starches they eliminate gi per
cent, of the oxygen as carbonic acid. All alcoholic
chinks, tea, and the ethereal oils considerably diminish
the elimination of carbonic acid, and so far as can yet
be judged, all these liquids increase the absorption
of oxygen (Proust, Vierordt). Speck’s experiments,
also, have shown that the elimination of carbonic
acid is intimately related to the ingestion of food.

In any case we may conclude — and Boussingault’s
observations on turtle-doves confirm that conclusion

that during sleep the gaseous exchange in our
bodies is diminished.

Thus we see that sleep modifies the mechanism of
respiration, rendering it more costal in men, while
at the same time the inspirations are lengthened,
the amount of inspired oxygen increased, and of
eliminated carbonic acid decreased. But that is not
all. Cardiac action is modified at the same time as
respiration; the heart works more slowly and less
energetically than during the waking condition. This
difference is marked even at the beginning of life.
Bouchart found that a child of from twenty-one days
to six months has a pulse of 140 awake, 12 1 asleep;
and from that age onward to the twenty-first month,
of 128 awake and 112 asleep. At the same time
the peripheral vessels dilate, the blood pressure
falls, and there is also a certain decrease of the
internal temperature, which may fall in winter as low
as 36.05° C. and in summer to 36.45°.^ The minimum

’ Mosso’s experiments on the human subject show that this diminu-
tion applies to the brain also, but that there is no perceptible connection
between a fall of temperature and the act of falling asleep. He has
also noted sudden rises of temperature which he calls organic confla-

RESPIRATION DURING SLEEP.

temperature is observed between midnight and three
o’clock in the morning, or, according to some observers,
between four and seven o’clock. The dilatation of the
surface vessels ap'pears earlier; they swell in the
evening, and thus it is that in the evening we find
that our collars and other close-fitting parts of our
garments become tight and uncomfortable. Martin
measured the volume of different parts of the body,
awake and asleep, and found that during quiet sleep
at night the chest became eight lines narrower,
while after a sleepless night the chest had enlarged
ten lines and the belly five. These observations were
made in the last century, but they are confirmed by
the contemporary investigations which demonstrate
the decreased gaseous excliange and the modification
of the respiratory mechanism during sleep.

But in thus analysing sleep, we must not forget
that it is not a permanent and invariable state but
presents certain modifications, according to the period
it has lasted, the time of night, the character of the
dreams, the state of the organism, whether or not any
supper has been taken, etc. Thus the pulse slackens
during sleep^a fact already known to Galen — but
this slackening is not constant and uniform; it always
presents certain variations. In a man whose pulse
was 70 between six and eight o’clock in the evening,
it was only 54 during sleep at midnight; after mid-
night it began to quicken, and this acceleration lasted
till two in the morning; then it slackened again to
accelerate once more at five or six o’clock. In the

gralions, and which may be produced by noises or other external stimuli
but do not appear to be connected with vivid dreams, or at all events
remembered dreams. (Mosso, “ Osservazioni sulla temperatura del
cervello dell’ uomo,’’ Atti dell' XL Congresso Medico Roma, vol. ii.)

SLEEP.

same way certain variations have been observed in
the volume of the thorax, and also of the hands, feet,
and abdomen; after two hours’ sleep the volume of
the thorax was -jfjth less than in the waking state;
after four hours’ sleep the decrease was ^\th, but only
■jj^th after six hours, the chest having again enlarged.
The volume of the hand had diminished after two
hours’ sleep by ^^^th and after four hours by /^th, while
after six hours the diminution was only ^^h. The
volume of the abdomen and feet after six hours’ sleep

I'l'

''ll

''''"Unit, nil,

i'<‘

Plethysmographic record taken from the arm of a person sleeping in the
laboratory. A fall in the curve indicates a decrease in the volume
of the arm. The curve is to be read in the direction of the arrow.
I, the night-watchman entering the laboratory, waking the sub-
ject, who shortly fell asleep again ; 2, the watchman spoke ; 3, the
watchman went out ; these changes (2 and 3) occurred without
awakening the subject. (From experiments made by Messrs.
Bardeen and Nichols, John Hopkins Medical School.)

was the same as when awake, but was diminished
after four hours. These variations during sleep have
not yet been sufficiently studied, but they need to be
taken into account.

Mosso’s plethysmographic experiments have, how-
ever, demonstrated the enlargement of the limbs
during sleep, and more recently. Professor Howell of
the John Hopkins University has studied the circula-
tion during sleep by carrying on a series of experi-
ments to determine the variations in volume of the

PLETHYSMOGRAPHIC CHANGES.

arm, as measured by a water plethysmography A
small plethysmograph was used, measuring the volume
changes only in the hand and lower part of the
fore-arm, and allowing comfortable freedom of move-
ment at the elbow ; it was thus possible to carry on
observation during the whole period of normal sleep.
Some twenty experiments were made, though all were
not entirely successful. It was found that from the
moment when the subject closed his eyes and
attempted to go to sleep the curve began to fall,
that is, that the portions of the arm within the

Records similar to that in figure on p. 12. Change in the volume of the
arm of the sleeping subject caused by the sound of a music-box
which was started at *. (Sleeper not awakened.)

plethysmograph undergo dilatation. As sleep comes
on, the curve continues to sink with fair regularity,
falling to its lowest point in one to one and a half
hours, when the dilatation of the arm reaches prac-
tically its maximum extent, remaining at this level
for an hour or two with certain rhythmical variations.
Then the curve shows a steady rise, quite gradual
for the first hour or more, but much more rapid for
the half-hour or so preceding final conscious awaking.
These changes in volume are interpreted by Professor

^ W. II. Howell, “ A Contribution to the Physiology of Sleep,
based upon Plethysmographic Experiments, of Experimental
Medici^ie, vol. ii. , No. 3, 1897.

SLEEP.

Howell as meaning a vaso-dilatation in the arm-
vessels, clue mainly to a relaxation of tone in the
skin vessels, which, there is every reason to believe,
occurs over the cutaneous surface generally. Conse-
quently there is a general fall of arterial pressure.^
Taking these facts together, Howell regards it as
highly probable that during sleep there is a diminished
peripheral resistance in the skin area, and therefore
a lower arterial pressure, and a smaller blood-flow
through the brain. During the period preparatory
to sleep the blood-flow through the brain begins to
diminish in quantity owing to the fall in arterial
pressure, and grows less for an hour or more after
sleep has appeared. After reaching its minimum
the brain circulation remains, with temporary varia-
tions, practically constant for one or two hours,
perhaps longer ; then the blood flowing through the
brain begins to increase gradually, following the rise
in blood pressure produced by the slow constriction
of the skin vessels, and becomes more rapid just
before spontaneous awakening, when it is approxi-
mately the same as when sleep appeared.

Thus, while the surface vessels of the body enlarge
more or less during sleep, the vessels of the brain con-
tract and its volume diminishes. Observations have
been effected regarding this point both on men and
on animals, and these observations have been further
verified by the examination of subjects whose brains
had been uncovered by injury to the head. All these
investigations have shown that the brain grows pale
and contracts while the subject is asleep, and on the

^ Tarchanoff {Arch. ital. de Biologic, 1894, p. 318) found that in
young dogs the fall of general arterial pressure on falling asleep
amounted to from 20 to 50 mm. of mercury.

VASOMOTOR REFLEXES DURING SLEER 1 5

contrary takes on a rosy hue and rises in the wound at
the moment of awaking. The depression of the brain
at the moment when the subject falls asleep has been
observed by Krauss, who found it equal to a millimetre.
Mosso has lately utilised such patients to follow by
the graphic method the variations which take place
in the volume of the brain during sleep. He found
that while it diminished during sleep, every sudden
noise or light disturbed repose and caused an increase
of volume without awaking the sleeper. Mosso’s
balance beautifully shows the connection between
sleep and anaemia of the brain. If the subject, when
horizontally poised on this balance, falls asleep, the
feet begin to fall, showing the blood has left the head,
and the inclination appears to be proportional to the
depth of sleep.

Professor Patrizi, of Tassari, has also shown by ex-
periments with the plethysmograph on two boys, one
of whom had a large opening in the cranial vault,
that the time occupied by the vasomotor reflexes is
instructive from this point of view. When various
stimuli — tactile, electric, thermal, etc. — are applied to
different regions in the waking state, it is found that
vasomotor reflexes follow at almost the same time,
whether the stimulus is applied to, for instance, the leg
or the arm, with a slight advantage in the latter case.
During sleep there is marked retardation in the vessels
of the brain, considerable retardation for the arm, while
the abdominal reflexes remain constant, so that there
seems to be a progressive diminution in the depth of
sleep as we proceed from the brain downwards.^

1 M. L. Patrizi, “II tempo clei riflessi vasali del cervello e delle
membra nella veglia e nel sonno,” Dritler internat. Cong. f. Psych.,
Munchen, 1897, p. 422.

SLEEP.

Recently, also, the studies of Dr. Leonard Hill
have shown a constant relationship between arterial
anaemia (with venous congestion) and sleep; and he
points out that to court sleep is to avoid all the
excitations from the external world which would
arouse the vasomotor centre. “ The vasomotor
centre is the hub around which turns the wheel
of a man’s active mental life.” ^

Similar results have been obtained by experiments
on animals (usually dogs) from which a fragment of
the bone of the skull has been removed by trepanation
and replaced by a watch-glass (Hammond, Durham).^
These experiments have shown positively that during
a more or less normal and quiet sleep the brains of
animals become more or less pale, and at the same
time diminish in volume. They become paler if the
animals have eaten before sleeping. Vizioli has
reached the same conclusions. He has also studied
the state of the spinal cord during sleep, and has
found that its vessels also present a certain con-
traction at this time. Having also observed the
blood pressure in the carotids during sleep, he has
found that it always diminishes.

After considering the state of the respiration, tem-
perature, heart, brain, and spinal cord in the sleeping
man, we are now naturally brought to consider the

^ Leonard Hill, The Cerebral Circulation^ London, 1896.

® W. A. Hammond’s experiments, which were earlier, are detailed
in his memoir on “Sleep and Insomnia,” Nexu York Medical Journal,
May 1865 ; Sleep and its Derangemexits, 1869 ; and Treatise on Insaiiity,
sec. iii., 1883. Durham’s careful investigations are recorded in “The
Physiology of Sleep,” Gtcy's Hospital Reports, i860, p. 149. But the
earliest demonstration of the anaemia of the brain during sleep seems
to have been furnished by Bonders, who in 1854 trepanned the skull
of a dog, inserting a piece of glass in place of the fragment of bone
removed.

ACTION OF THE SKIN. 17

state of the other organs of the body during
sleep.

The sweat-glands of the skin act more or less
energetically during sleep, a fact which may be ex-
plained in part by the dilatation of the vessels of the
skin, and in part by the influence of the sweat centre,
which is situated in the middle of the medulla (Adam-
kewietch, Marme, Navrotzky), and is irritated by the
carbonic acid. The observations of Santorini and
Becker have shown that the skin acts more energ-eti-

cally at night and during sleep, and that this in part
explains why the atmosphere of our bedrooms becomes
impure more rapidly than that of the rooms in which
we carry on the occupations of our waking life. It
must not be forgotten that the skin eliminates at least
twice as much vapour as the lungs. It is in conse-
quence of this active perspiration that during sleep
we are more liable to chills than when awake.

V The internal organs during sleep are in a condition
of more or less pronounced anaemia, for the very
reason that the skin is in a state of hyperaemia, or
gorged with blood. Busch’s observations on a patient
with fistula of the stomach demonstrated that the
movements of the stomach and intestines were in-
terrupted or more or less enfeebled during nocturnal
sleep, while on the contrary they went on uninter-
ruptedly if the patient slept in the course of the day.^
The same phenomenon of enfeeblement or temporary
arrest is observed in the functions of the other secret-
ing organs — the kidneys, salivary glands, etc. — but
this does not mean that these organs are necessarily
in a state of inactivity during sleep. On the contrary,
sleep is not modified when the stomach and intestines

^ Virchow’s Arc/iiv., 1858, Bd. xiv.

SLEEP.

continue in full activity, as we may easily convince
ourselves by observing little children, who after eating
peacefully fall asleep. Among us in Russia the
peasant likes to eat when the daily work is over and
to go to bed immediately afterwards. In many cases,
indeed, we shall find that a meal taken immediately
before going to bed may even be beneficial. Facts
of this order show that the digestive organs may con-
tinue in full activity during sleep. Busch’s patient,
also, digested perfectly when she slept in the course
of the day. Observations and experiments on animals
prove that food taken before going to sleep is assimi-
lated very well during sleep, much better than if the
animal is forced to walk or run after feeding.

In the same way the kidneys may secrete as actively
during sleep as in the waking condition (Durham);
sometimes they can act more energetically during
sleep; thus Becker and Penzoldt, as well as Fleischer,
have shown by direct experiment that more urine is
sometimes secreted during the night than during the
day. Mendel found that more phosphoric acid is
secreted by night than by day (though this is not in
accord with the results of Beaunis), and Marro also
found that during sleep there is greater elimination
of phosphoric acid and especially of the earthy phos-
phates, while often, on the other hand, a greater
elimination of the alkaline phosphates accompanies
mental activity, but he admits that the amount of
phosphoric acid is influenced by many causes.^
According to Bouchard, the urine during sleep is
more poisonous in its effects on animals than that
of the waking, the former being a convulsant, while
the latter only produces narcotic effects. The
^ A. Marro, Lavoro Rlentale e Ricambio Maieriale, Turin, 1S89.

THE BLOOD DURING SLEEP.

general tendency is, however, for the functions of the
kidneys to be less active during sleep on account
of the greater activity of the skin. Vogel found
that less urea is excreted at night — 42 gramm.
during the 12 hours of day against 36 at night.
Beigel’s observations, further, show that there are, as
indeed might be expected, fewer variations and
irregularities in ‘ the excretion of urine during the
night, and that, for instance, the amount excreted
by the two sexes is more nearly equal than during
the day.

On the whole we may consider it as certain that it
is possible for all the organs of the body to be active
during sleep, with the exception of the nervous system,
and even this exception is not constant, as we shall
shortly see^ The opinion that sleep always causes an
enfeeblement or arrest of organic activity is chiefly
founded on observations on hibernating animals ;
hibernation cannot, however, be considered a form
of normal sleep.

We have seen that respiration is lowered during
sleep, and as this exchange is effected by the
mediation of the blood and its red corpuscular ele-
ments, it is natural to ask what then takes place in
the blood. Unfortunately we still lack the precise
scientific facts which would enable us to answer this
question positively; but we may find some indirect
information in the observations which have been
made, on the one hand, on persons who pass
sleepless nights, and on animals deprived of sleep;
and on the other hand, on animals in a state of
hibernation. Thus, for example, Keyes found that
the number of red corpuscles in the blood showed
a considerable diminution after several sleepless

SLEEP.

nights passed at the bedside of persons who were
seriously On the other hand, Byford has found

that every sleepless night accelerates the circu-
lation of the blood, a fact which he thus explains:
under the influence of partial or total lack of sleep,
the blood undergoes certain changes, losing in part its
capacity to fix oxygen and thus becomes impoverished,
as regards its red corpuscles, and insufficient to
maintain the gaseous exchange to the degree which
the activity of all the organs and tissues renders
necessary; thus the circulation becomes more rapid,
because its rapidity can in some degree compensate
its poverty in red corpuscles, of which the function is
to distribute oxygen throughout the body.^

With regard to animals, I have myself found that
in puppies experimentally deprived of sleep there is
a pronounced diminution in the number of the red
corpuscles. Valentin believed that after prolonged
hibernation there are no longer any traces of the
white blood corpuscles, but this may depend, as we
shall see later, on the immobility of hibernating
animals. In any case, however, we must finally
conclude that we still know little that is definite
concerning the state of the blood during sleep.

The Nervous System diLring Sleep. — What takes
place in the central and peripheral nervous system
during sleep ? Certainly, we all know that when they
wish to go to sleep animals as well as men always
seek a quiet corner, sheltered from every dis-
turbing noise, every bright light, etc., in a word

1 Keyes, “ The Effect of Small Doses of Mercury in Modifying the
Number of the Red Corpuscles in Syphilis,” Am. Journal of the Med.
Sciences, 1876, No. 141.

^ Ryford, Am. Jottrnal of the Med. Sciences, April 1856.

THE STATE OF THE NERVOUS SYSTEM.

from all the impressions of the external world which
manifest themselves to us subjectively as a series of
sensations. Thus, when going to sleep, we all lower
our eyelids over our eyes and seek a comfortable
position which will avoid the necessity for any mus-
cular effort. In the arrangement of our beds may be
traced the same desire to remove everything which
would make too -strong an impression on our senses.
Facts of this kind show that our peripheral nerves
and sensorial organs are still able to act during sleep,
and to transmit the impressions which the central
nervous system transforms into conscious sensations.
We thus reach the conclusion that the whole peri-
pheral nervous system preserves during sleep some
power of action, and that to prevent and arrest its
activity at the moment of falling asleep, and during
sleep itself, we are forced to employ artificial methods,
that is to say to avoid and prevent all irritations and
impressions coming from without. This is a con-
clusion drawn from the observation of ordinary life.
If we turn to scientific literature, we seem at first to
meet very contradictory conclusions : some assure
us that sensibility becomes more intense in the
evening and during sleep (Moreau, Nathan, Fqd6r6,
Macario, etc.) ; others, on the contrary, maintain
that sensibility is deadened at this time (Burdach,
Lemoine, Lotze, etc.). But if we analyse the illus-
trations brought forward by either party we shall
find that all those who speak of the deadening of
sensibility during sleep have investigated, not sensi-
bility itself, but conscious sensation, for example,
sensations of pain, while the others have examined
reflex acts. We must not, however, identify the
functional capacity of the nervous apparatus with the

SLEEP.

•

1 •'

•

b' l\

inti

n 1 1 \\

... y

In all these figures * shows a reinforcement of the knee-jerk by some
cause or another. In Fig. i the subject fell asleep where the curve
is lowest, and * shows the point at which he was called. The other
figures show reinforcements occurring during the waking state, and
due in Fig. 2 to repetition of a poem ; Fig, 3, to talking; Fig. 4,
itching of the ears; Fig. 5, the crying of a child; Fig. 6, the act
of swallowing.

THE KNEE-JERK.

activity of consciousness, for consciousness can be
interrupted without arresting the functions of the
nerves of touch, the temperature nerves, and other
sensory nerves.

It is of some interest to consider the functional
aptitudes of the nervous apparatus during sleep.
In this connection reference may be made to the
influence of sleep on the knee-jerk — that is to say, the
involuntary kick given by the leg, hanging loosely,
when the knee is smartly struck. The various in-
fluences which affect the knee-jerk were carefully
investigated by Lombard some years ago. Stern*
berg had previously found that an extreme condition
of general exhaustion, whether produced by physical
or mental causes, is accompanied by increase of the
tendon reflexes. Lombard found that this was not
true of slighter degrees of fatigue, nor was it true of
sleep. Cerebral inactivity and sleep alike exerted a
depressing effect on the knee-jerk. It is evident that
the amount of the knee-jerk is largely dependent on
the activity of the cerebral centres, and this is further
illustrated by Lombard’s repeated observation that
a dream of active movement would be associated
with a very violent knee-jerk, showing that even
during sleep a certain amount of cerebral activity
is making itself felt throughout the body. During
quiet sleep, and in the absence of other sources of
stimulation, external or internal, the knee-jerk may
entirely disappear, as is shown in the following
graphic record (p. 24) of the knee-jerk in a de-
mented patient, furnished by Dr. Noyes. The knee

^ W. P. Lombard, “The Variations of the Normal Knee-jerk, and
their Relation to the Activity of tlie Central Nervous System, Ai/t,
Journ, Psychology, vol. i., No. i, 1887.

SLEEP.

was tapped at regular intervals of five seconds.
When the patient was asleep and all was quiet
no response was obtained. After such a period
the sound of some one walking on the floor below
caused at A a series of kicks, slowly diminishing, and
renewed by the same cause at B. At C two taps

with a pencil and a distant locomotive whistle pro-
duced a larger series.

Other movements of more or less reflex character
have also been investigated during sleep. Thus
Rosenbach^ has systematically observed the reflexes
excited in children by tickling the palm of hand, the
sole of foot, and occasionally other parts of the body;
also the cremasteric, abdominal and tendon reflexes,'
and the pupil reaction. At bedtime, and when
sleepy, reflex excitability increases, a stage of restless-
ness comparable to the convulsive stage of chloroform
narcosis. During the first period of sleep, and while
it is still light, there is weakening of reflexes and
commencing contraction of pupil ; in the second, or

' O. Rosenbach, Zeitschrift f, kUnische Med., 1881, Bd. i., Heft 2,
and summarised by Waller in Brain, 1882, p. 138.

THE BRAIN DURING SLEEP.

deeper period, abdominal, cremasteric, and tendon
reflexes are abolished; in deepest sleep, tickling the
sole of foot, the nose, or ear still causes reflex move-
ment. Rosenbach considers that the active contrac-
tion of the sphincters during sleep is due to direct
cerebral activity protecting the outlets; because if
sleep was only a cerebral paralysis we .should get
increased spinal reflexes as in decapitated animals,
instead of finding that as sleep deepens the reflexes
weaken.

An experimental investigation by Professor Tar-
chanoff is specially interesting from the present point
of view. His experiments were made on puppies,
which, on account of their age, easily fall asleep, and
thus enable us to observe normal sleep. Tarchanoff
investigated the state of the cerebral cortex, of the
different sensory nerves, and also of the spinal cord
during sleep. These experiments showed positively
that the brain grows pale when the animals are
asleep, that at the same time the cortex ceases to
react readily to electrical stimulations which in the
waking condition were always strong enough to give
well-marked muscular reactions, and that, finally, the
spinal cord and the different sensory nerves do not
sleep, while sensations of pain are deadened to
consciousness. The nerves transmit the painful im-
pressions, but the consciousness of the sleeping
animal cannot perceive them, or perceives them
but feebly and incompletely.^

I may also mention here the observations of Pro-
fessors VVedensky, Waller, and Bowditch, who have
shown that the nerves generally may act during an

^ Tarchanoff, “ Observations sur le Sommeil Normal,” Atti deW XL
CongresiO-.Medico Iniernazionale, vol. ii.

SLEEP.

indefinite period, as they do not become fatigued ;
fatigue is not so much a periplieral as a central
change.^

I have already noted the fact that every irritation
and impression which falls on the body of a sleeping
man produces a change in the volume of the brain,
and it is easy to understand that this phenomenon
would not occur if the sensory nerves were asleep
and not in full activity. It must not be forgotten
that these changes in the volume of the brain are
observed under the influence of the most various
irritations — impressions of hearing, luminous and
tactile impressions, etc. — so that the sensory nerves
in question are ready to fulfil their ordinary func-
tions, that is to say that they can receive irritations
or impressions and transmit them to the cerebral
centres.

It is thus evident that the various sensory nerves,
as well as the spinal cord, are more or less in-
capable of fatigue and therefore remain awake during
sleep.

It still remains to consider the condition of the
voluntary muscles. Among various authors who have
written on sleep (Despine, Moreau, etc.), we often
find the opinion that one of the phenomena of sleep
is the complete arrest of all voluntary movement, or,
in other words, that the muscular system with its
motor nerves sleeps. It is sufficient to observe the

^ Wedensky (using the telephone to detect negative variation of
faradised nerve), Cthlatt. f Med. PViss., 1884; Waller (using the gal-
vanometer to avoid fallacy of telephone), “Fatigue and Recovery,”
Brit. Med. Jour., 1885-86; and finally Bowditch (by the unimpeach-
able method of curarising the animal), “ Note on the Nature of Nerve
Force,” Jour, oj Physiology, 1855, and “ Nachweis der Unermiidlich-
keit des Saugethiernerven,” Du Bois-Reymond’s Archiv., 1890.

TALKING IN SLEEP.

facts of daily life in order to assure ourselves that this
opinion is erroneous. We all know, in fact, that a
sleeping person changes his position whenever it
becomes uncomfortable, and without awaking takes
an easier position. In the same way, it is recognised
that sleeping persons execute with their hands move-
ments that are altogether rational 5 for example, they
brush away a. fly from the face, or draw back the
disturbed bed-clothes.

Bdrner tried the experiment of placing a heavy cover-
let over the faces of persons in deep sleep; without
awaking, the sleepers always removed the impediment
which hindered their free respiration. Occasionally
persons arise from bed and empty a distended
bladder without awaking. Certain birds always sleep
on one leg, and those which sleep on the water in this
way, as Headley points out, have a habit of gently
paddling with the foot, thus slowly revolving in a
circle; so that a group of voluntary muscles continues
to act uninterruptedly during sleep. In the old days
before railways, postillions and others often slept on
the journey. Hammond has frequently seen soldiers
asleep on horseback during a night march, and has
so slept himself. Infantry often fall asleep during
forced marches; in such cases they continue to
make all the necessary movements, walk at a regu-
lated pace, hold their guns, etc., without awaking.
Cuming knew a punkah-wallah who could work
the punkah with his foot fairly well while sound
asleep.

The frequency of talking during sleep is a familiar
fact, and various observers (Lotze, Berillon, Moll)
have pointed out that some persons will answer
questions and obey commands during sleep. This point

SLEEP.

was inyestio-ated by Spcir, Armstrong, and Child.i'
these investigators, among 200 college students of
both sexes, between the ages of twenty and thirty
found that 41 per cent men and 37 per cent women
ta k in dieir sleep. More than half of the women who
talked m their sleep, and more than a third of the men
reported that they were able to answer questions
when asleep, and the women more often than the men
were able to answer questions on any subject, and not
merely on that they were talking about The propor-
tion of those who talk in their sleep is much higher
below twenty-five than above that age. Somnambu-
lists, again, while fast asleep execute complicated and
often dangerous muscular acts, climbing up steep
roofs, and maintaining a delicately poised equilibrium.
From the scientific side, also, the observations of
Tarchanoff on reflex actions during sleep have
diiectly shown that the motor nerves and voluntary
muscles preserve power of activity during sleep.

We thus reach the conclusion that during sleep
the brain alone is really asleep. As, however,
the brain is constituted of a large number of
different centres, which subserve the most various
ends, it is natural to ask whether it is the whole
brain which sleeps or only a more or less defined
portion. After what has just been said of volun-
tary muscular movements during deep sleep, we
are forced to conclude that the centres of the brain by
the impulsion of which these voluntary movements
are accomplished — as for example, the marching of
soldiers while asleep, the muscular labour necessary
to hold the gun in a certain position, the walk of a

^ “Statistics of ‘Unconscious Cerebration,’” Am. fount. Psych
Nov. 1892. ^ .

REFLEX MOVEMENTS.

sentry in a certain given direction and extent — could
not function unless they were awake at the moment
when these movements were executed the sleepers.

The same thing is shown by Tarchanoff’s experi-
ments. He took puppies whose spinal cords he had
completely divided above the lumbar region some
weeks previously, and which had recovered from the
operation. When they were asleep he applied electric
stimulation to ‘the hind paws, innervated exclusively
by the cut portion of the spinal cord, and found that
the reflex movements of the paws were the same as
during the waking state. On applying similar stimu-
lation to the front paws, innervated by the anterior
part of spinal cord and by the brain, he found that
reflex movement was decidedly less than in the
waking state and that a'stronger current was required.
Thus it is evident that the brain is not wholly inactive
during sleep, but that it contributes a depressive
action which participates in the formation of the
reflex movements obtained in the anterior part of the
body of the sleeping puppy. We also know that
different stimuli applied to hearing, smell, and taste,
even luminous impressions also, may cause a whole
series of reflex movement in sleep without causing
the sleeper to awake, except they are of such energy
as to pass over the threshold of consciousness (Herbart,
Fechner) ; then the sleeper awakes with the conscious-
ness that he has been aroused.

We are thus able to state that not only are the
optic, auditory, olfactory, and gustatory nerves awake
and active during sleep, but also the cerebral centres
corresponding to those nerves.

The justice of this conclusion is shown from another
side by the evidence of dreams, because if these

SLEEP.

nervous centres were asleep and consequently in-
active, we should not receive in our dreams represen-
tations belonging to the senses of smell, taste, touch,
the muscular sense, and common sensation. All the
sensations and all the images of dreams are only
possible on one condition : that the corresponding
centres m the nervous system are in a state of activit)^
that is to say more or less awake. It is precisely

800 —

700 —

-A

600 —

i \

500 —

400 —

[ _

1
300 ~r

200 -j-

100 j—

—

HOURS 0J5 LO 1.5 £.0 25 3.0 3.5 4.0 43 5.0 5.

5 6

0 6.

S 7.

3 7.

5 7.8

Curve illustrating strength of auditory stimulus (falling ball) necessary
to waken a sleeping person. The hours are marked below, and
the tests were made at half-hourly intervals. The curve shows
that the height from which the ball must be dropped reaches its
maximum at the end of the first hour (Kohlschlitter).

because the different nervous channels and the corre-
sponding cerebral centres are awake during sleep
that it is possible to arouse a sleeping person at any
desired moment.

From this point of view lVIosso*s experiments
(recorded in his book on the temperature of the
brain), especially those on Delphina Parodi, a young
girl who in consequence of an accident had lost a

THE DEPTH OF SLEEP.

portion of the fronto-parietal region of the skull, are
of great interest This physiologist has observed that
any unexpected noise, a touch, in fact any external
stimulus which affects the sleeper, at once brings
about a change in the volume and temperature of the
brain, that is to say that the cerebral vessels receive
a considerable afflux of blood under these circum-
stances, and this temporary cerebral hyperaemia is
observed even when the impressions which provoke
it are too slight to awake the sleeper or to leave any
memory behind. Owing to the fact that the nervous
channels and corresponding cerebral centres preserve
their activity during sleep, it is possible to measure
the depth of sleep; for all the methods employed to
this end rest on the supposition that the nerves and
centres do not sleep. The principle of all these
methods is reduced to the discovery of the intensity
of the stimulus needed at different periods of normal
sleep to arouse the sleeper, in other words to force
the threshold of sleep, which naturally results in
awaking the sleeper. It has been found that the best
method of measurement is to drop a metallic sub-
stance on to a metallic surface from different heights
Kohlschiitter, Mdnninghoff, and Peisbergen have thus
measured the depth of normal sleep and have found
that it increases during the first and second hour,
after which it begins to decrease in a pronounced
manner, then it again increases, and after attaining
a certain level is more or less maintained at that
level. Each awakening produces an increased inten-
sity of sleep, and the same effect is observed even
when a pronounced weakening of sleep stops short of
complete awakening. Michelson’s results were very
similar ; by measuring the intensity of sleep by the

SLEEP.

height at which a brass ball must be dropped to
awaken the sleeper, he found that the deepest sleep
IS reached in about one hour and three-quarters;
after that it gradually decreases, with, however, fairly
regular rhythmic fluctuations. The experimenter
manipulated the apparatus in an adjoining room,
and the subject retired to rest unaware that any
experiment was to be made. Not more than two
experiments were ever made in one night.^ In view
of some slight discrepancies in these results. Professor
Howell tested his own curve of sleep intensity, using
a new method by which the depth of sleep was
measured by the strength of a current from an
induction coil necessary to waken the sleeper, the
stimulating electrodes (so constructed as to remain
moistened with glycerine during the entire period)
being placed upon the forehead, and the amount of
the induced current measured directly in scale de-
flections of a dynamometer. It was found that the
normal intensity of sleep follows in general the curve
described by Kohlschiitter, the maximum being
reached in the first hour or so; the curve did not,
however, approach so nearly to the base line in the
second hour and subsequently as in Kohlschiitter’s
curves. These experiments show that the first two
or three hours of sleep are the most important, for
it is during these hours that sleep reaches its culmi-
nating point.

Psychic Phenomena during Sleep, — We thus reach
the conclusion that during sleep nothing is asleep
within us except the brain, and that even the brain
is not wholly asleep but only some of its elements.

1 Michelson, Untersuclnmgen iiber die Tiefe des Schlafes, Diss.
Dorpat, 1891.

THE CURVE OF SLEEP.

Curves of sleep for three subjects (L., M., II.). N, night sleep;
D, day sleep; S, summer sleep; W, winter sleep; C, sleep from
narcotics. The numbers on horizontal lines show hours after falling
asleep; the numbers on the vertical lines give the energy of the
falling ball in thousands of gram centimetres, i.e., the weight of
ball multiplied by height of fall (Michelson).

SLEEP.

We still have to ascertain what it is that sleeps in
the brain. We have seen that the sleeper may be
within reach of sensations of hearing, smell, touch,
etc, although he is not fully conscious of them and
does not awake ; but his brain in such cases always
increases in volume and the cerebral vessels distend, as
has been observed many times, and first by Blumen-
bach in subjects whose skulls were injured in such a
manner as to render visible the pulsation of the
brain ; it has then been found that during dreams
the brain would sometimes rise above the edges of
the wound to an even greater extent than during the
waking state.

I have already referred to the well-known fact that
some people talk during sleep, so that the organs of
speech must be in a state compatible* with their
activity. On the other hand, medical science has
sometimes described cases of persons deeply asleep
who, on any attempt to awake them, merely said:
“ Leave me alone,” and again fell into the same deep
sleep, on awaking from which of their own accord
they were unable to recall either their own remarks
or the effort to arouse them (Despine). Cleghorn
mentions the case of a man in an exhausted con-
dition, who awoke from sleep, took his share of
supper with his comrades, sang some songs with
them, and went to bed again, without being able to
recall any of these events in the morning. Aber-
crombie narrates a still more interesting case : a
lawyer, exhausted by a long sitting of the court,
went with his friends to supper at a restaurant; then
they talked, drank, bade each other farewell, and
dispersed each to his own home, including the
lawyer; he went to bed, and on the next day

ABILITY TO WAKE AT A FIXED HOUR. 35

could recall nothing that had taken place, being
convinced that he had gone straight home from the
court.

How should we explain cases of this kind ? By-
exhaustion, by the sleep of memory ? Yes, but
we must distinguish two elements in memory : the
memory peculiar to each tissue and cell of the body,
and conscious memory. In the cases just brought
forward it was precisely conscious memory that was
enfeebled, or, in other words, consciousness itself, for
conscious memory is nothing more than the per-
sistence of the traces imprinted on our consciousness
by sensations, etc.

Some authors^ have also maintained that during
sleep it is our attention and our will (or apperception,
as Wundt and his disciples would say) that are
asleep, and it is no doubt true that there is no
surer means to produce sleep than to fatigue at-
tention. But if this were so we should not be able
to awake at a fixed hour, or on hearing a determined
sound, however feeble. Many of us have been able
to recognise that if on going to sleep we order our-
selves, as it were, to awake at such and such an hour,
this order is obeyed and we awake at the appointed
time. It is a very useful aptitude if, for example, we
have to nurse a patient who is seriously ill, for we
can awake every hour or every two hours to give
the patient medicine, and at the same time obtain
the sleep necessary to preserve our own strength.
Broussais records the case of a gentleman who
possessed this faculty in a very high degree; if he
were awakened at any hour of the night and asked

For example, Kiilpe, Ouiltnes of Psychology (tr. by Titchener),
London, 1895, P- 45 n

SLEEP.

the time he would answer the question at once
wit lout even glancing' at his watch. He was never
mistaken in his replies, so that while he slept he must
have retained an exact notion of the course of time.
It is still more interesting to observe how a mother
awakes at the slightest movement of the infant she
tenderly loves, although, as Jouffroy, who long since
noted this fact, has pointed out, even the loudest
tempest may not succeed in arousing her.

This phenomenon has been specially studied in
America by Speir, Armstrong, and Child.i These
observers obtained answers from two hundred ‘college
students of both sexes between the ages of twenty
and thirty. They found that 59 per cent, possessed
the power of waking at a given time without being
distuibed before. About two-thirds of these seldom
or never fail in their attempt. Only about a third of
these are conscious of any special feeling as they
awake, and about two-thirds awake directly. A
smaller percentage of women (51) than of men (62)
possess the power of waking at a given time. With
increasing age there are fewer failures in waking at
the given hour. The special feeling experienced on
waking is usually described as a troubled feeling, “a
feeling that I must wake,” “that something must be
done, etc. One tells how, though a very sound
sleeper, he was able to wake up regularly and
exactly every two hours for six weeks to administer
medicine to his wife, never once missing; “ I always
came directly from oblivion into consciousness,” he
wrote; “I was as exact and methodical during the
first few nights as at the last.”

Statistics of Unconscious Cerebration,’” American Jounial of
Psychology, Nov. 1892.

ATTENTION DURING SLEEP.

Facts of this order are only possible on one con-
dition : the sleeper’s attention remains concentrated
on certain sounds or on a group of determined re-
presentations, which supposes an act of will ; and it
is evident that under such conditions the sleeper’s
attention and will must preserve their activity during
the whole duration of sleep.^

The degree of intensity to which our attention may
be maintained during sleep is shown by the following
case : On going to bed a man recalled that he must
rise the next day at eight, at the same time quite for-
getting that his clock was half-an-hour fast. In the
middle of the night he awoke and on looking at his
clock remembered that it was half-an-hour fast, and
that consequently he must wake, not when the clock
struck eight, but half-an-hour later. He then fell into a
sound slumber, which lasted until he felt himself dis-
turbed by some unknown cause. He started up with
the dread that he had awakened too late, but looking
at his clock, he saw-that it pointed exactly to half-
past eight. Thus, in spite of deep sleep, the sleeper’s

' Maudsley, in this connection, recalls that the respiration and pulse
beats continue during sleep, sending their measured thrill to the brain,
which, when awake, receives them more or less consciously. “Why
then wonder that the brain, in whose nature and function time and
proportion are ingraft, does that unconsciously, and even makes more
delicate time-registers of the finer and more subtile organic processes ?
Had the brain not that unconscious faculty, the cleverest consciousness
might labour in vain to count” {Pathology of Mind, 1895, p. 123),
It may be added that this power of judging time precisely is sometimes
found in the waking state also, though some sub-conscious process
seems to be generally involved. In the American Journal of Psychology
(April 1896) may be found the carefully recorded case of a gentleman
(Director of Physical Culture in the University of California) who, at
any moment of the day or night, was able to tell the time within three
minutes; he considered that he had acquired this power from the
habits of his work, which required accuracy in timing;

SLEEP.

attention and will not only followed the course of
time, but even corrected the error of the clock ; the
man slept soundly while the clock loudly struck
eight and awoke when the hand silently pointed to
the half-hour.i Will and attention are also equally
active in dreams ; with this question we shall have
to deal later on. I only wish to mention here the
well-established fact (Jouffroy) that persons of feeble
character cannot awake at a fixed hour. There can
be no doubt, however, that force of character is pro-
portional to development of the consciousness. So
that we may conclude that consciousness is interrupted
while the other functions continue to act with more
or less energy during sleep.

In analysing the psychology of dreams we shall
see that the most various emotions and passions may
act in the sleeping man. In this way we may

^ The action of will and attention during sleep is also well shown in
the treatment of somnambulism adopted by a schoolmaster, as narrated
by him to Hack Tuke (Art. “Sleep,” Diet. Psych. Med.)-. “Shortly
before the youthful somnambulist retires to rest his master calls him
aside, and speaking in a firm and solemn tone says, ‘ I find you were
out of bed and making a disturbance in your room last night.’ ‘ Sir,’
he replies, ‘ I was asleep, I know nothing about it.’ Then the master
replies, ‘ I will say nothing about it on this occasion, but such a thing
must not occur again.’ ‘But, sir, I could not help it; I was asleep.’

‘ Well,’ the master replies, ‘ you hear what I say. I would not advise
you to let it occur again.'” The schoolmaster added that in such a
case the boy goes to bed probably feeling that he has been hardly dealt
with, but with a motive for checking the tendency to somnambulism,
and the motive continues to act during sleep. This method invariably
proved successful.

In such a case we seem to witness the action of suggestion acting
inversely to that applied during hypnosis. I may refer to a case
recorded by Ringier of a young girl who was told by her companions
that she would wet the bed because she had plucked the meadow crow-
foot (called pisse-en-lit in Switzerland), and who really became subject
to nocturnal incontinence of urine in consequence.

THE STATE OF THE EYES.

explain the diversity of opinion among authors as to
the state of the visual axes and of the pupils during
sleep, for it is known that the pupils are modified
by the emotions, dilating, for instance, under the
influence of fear; it would not therefore be surprising
to find variations in the pupils, for they might be due
to the different feelings and ideas experienced by
the sleeping person in dreams. Another source of
fallacy is the fact that disturbance of the sleeping
person causes a change in the eyes. In falling asleep
the axes of the eyes converge and turn upward; this
condition is reproduced when we try to raise the
eyelid, and hence the common opinion that it repre-
sents the usual state of the eyes during sleep (Bell,
J. Muller, Rehlmann and VVitkowsky, etc.). It
seems now, however, to be established that the axes
of the eye are parallel, as if directed towards a
distant object (Sander), but are sometimes divergent
(Lemoine), as they are in profound stupor from
cerebral disease, though in ordinary mental stupor
they may be convergent (Hack Tuke). With regard
to the state of the pupils, I have myself observed in
young children that they are dilated, and at the moment
of awaking it is certainly the rule for the eyes to be
very dilated, even in the presence of strong light.
During sound sleep, however, there can now be no
doubt that the pupils are contracted, and the deeper
the sleep the more they are contracted (J. Muller,
Rehlmann and Witkowsky, Sander). This point has
been well brought out by the extensive observations of
Plotke.^ Even when the pupil is dilated by atropine
it becomes contracted during sleep. The condition
of the pupil during sleep thus resembles its condition
^ Archiv. fiir Psychiatric, Bd. x.. Heft i.

SLEEP.

during hypnosis, as observed by Moll, Sgrosso, and

I may also refer here to the discussions which
have taken place among- various authors as to the
leal reason why we lower our eyelids at the moment
of going to sleep. Bichat tried to show that they
aie lowered because of the relaxation of the muscles,
that there is, so to say, a temporary paralysis. This
opinion has been disputed by Stokes, who supposes
that the eyes close because the muscles act like
sphincters and contract independently of the will.
It seems to me simpler and more natural to believe
that men and animals voluntarily close the eyes in
order to guard the visual apparatus as much as
possible from all stimuli coming from without. This
precaution is necessary, because the eyes never sleep,
and to reduce them to inactivity special artificial
measures are required. The probability of this ex-
planation is confirmed by the fact that persons who
are seriously ill and almost at the point of death
always sleep with the eyes half-open or even quite
open. This is due to the fact that the impres-
sionability of the optic nerves and the receptivity of
the cerebral centres are becoming dulled. It is easy
to understand that such sleep foreshadows the
approach of death, and in -any case indicates a
state of grave danger.

The Theories of Sleep. — Having completed crur
study of the chief changes which take place in the
organism during sleep, we have now to consider the
various theories of sleep.

First of all we have theories which assign some
localised cause, explaining sleep by the action of
this or that organ or tissue. Thus, for example.

LOCAL THEORIES OF SLEEP.

some authors have regarded the thyroid gland as the
organ of sleep (Forncris), and they expressed the
opinion that every night the neck enlarges from the
swelling of this gland, due to the accumulation of
blood which comes from the brain, this stasis of blood
in the thyroid gland being the direct cause of sleep.
The theory is erroneous, and is sufficiently disproved
by the fact that persons from whom this gland is
removed are not liable to suffer from insomnia
(Kocher) ; indeed it has been observed that persons
deprived of the thyroid gland have, on the contrary,
a special tendency to sleep, and are subject to
constant sleepiness. The same phenomenon has
been observed in those who suffer from atrophy of
the gland.

Another theory of the local order places the organ
of sleep in the arachnoid plexus, which works during
sleep, filling the ventricles of the brain and thus
interrupting all communication between the brain
and the body generally. To prove the truth of this
theory, its author (Osborne) described three cases
of obstinate insomnia. At the autopsies of these
patients he found the plexus in a very changed
condition and full of vesicles. It is only necessary
to remark that this theory is contradicted by all the
observations which demonstrate that sleep is always
accompanied by cerebral anaemia.

Among the number of local theories of sleep must
also be counted that set forth by Puikinje. He
supposed that the ganglia at the base of the brain, by
reason of an unusual afflux of blood, compress the
bundles of the coroiia radiata, and thus interrupt the
communication of the brain with the external world.
Exner, in arguing against this theory, rightly remarks

SLEEP.

that if it were correct, our consciousness would
remain unchanged during sleep, which is, however
by no means the case. ’

The vasomotor theory of sleep has enjoyed a far
wider eurrency. It has found a solid basis on the
ork of Durham, Hammond, Vizioli, Tarchanoff, and

thJ\h investigators have proved

hat the brain is anaemic during sleep, bringing for-

war arguments against the belief previously accepted
according to which sleep is only possible when the
ram is in a state of venous stasis (Cappie, Langlet,
Blumroder etc.). The theory that sleep is a condLn
of cerebral congestion is a very ancient one, and
during the past hundred years it has received the
support of Cabanis, Marshall Hall, Macnish, W. B.
Carpenter, G. H. Lewes, Holland, and Sieveking
among others. It no doubt originated, as Hammond
as pointed out, in a false analogy between sleep and
comatose states in which there is really a condition of
cerebral congestion. Blumenbach, in a case of injury
to the skull, was probably the first to ascertain by
actual observadon that the condition is one of ansemia.

urham m his careful and conclusive experiments,
trephined the skull of a dog in the region of the
sin a put and replaced the bone by a watch-glass
which protected the brain from the influence of the
air, and through which he was able to study all the
Ranges that took place in the brain. Unfortunately
Durham, as well as Mosso and the other observers
who have followed him in the same path, usually
made their experiments on animals which had been
put under the influence of chloroform, morphia, or
c oral hydrate. It must be added, however, both
as regards Durham and Hammond, that they waited

THE VASOMOTOR THEORY,

until the narcosis was over and the animal had been
fed, when normal sleep set in. If there was any doubt
it has been dissipated by Tarchanoff. His experi-
ments were carried out on young puppies, who sleep
quickly and easily, so that the observer has no need
to resort to artificial methods of putting them to
sleep, but is able to examine the changes in the
brain during sleep that is entirely normal and
natural.

Durham showed that during sleep the brain be-
comes anaemic. By tying a ligature to the jugular
veins he was also able to observe the results of venous
stasis in the brain, and convinced himself that under
such circumstances the brain is in a condition entirely
unlike that of normal sleep. It also occurred to him to
produce artificial anaemia of the brain by ligaturing
the carotid arteries, and he thus obtained a condition of
the brain similar to that which he had obtained during
sleep. Fleming tried on himself and his friends the
experiment of compressing the carotid arteries in the
neck for thirty seconds, and always succeeded in pro-
ducing immediate and deep sleep; “a soft humming
in the ears is heard; a sense of tingling steals over the
body, and in a few seconds complete unconsciousness
and insensibility supervene, and continue so long as
the pressure is maintained.” The result is not attained
unless the pressure is strong enough to cause all
pulsation of the carotids to disappear. He also
attempted to compress the jugular veins as well as
the arteries, and then the subject’s face became red
and he only fell asleep slowly and with difficulty, nor
was the sleep deep.^ Corning instances the case of a
man with acute mania of a violent and protracted

^ Brit, and For, Medico- Chtrurgical Review^ April 1855.

SLEEP.

character; when an instrument devised by Cornin<r
was apphed to the carotids the man’s cries and

to™ ed he was led
Attain ’aV™ k ® sleep, i

coveril; “tht™"? °T'''

fc, anteiior fontanelle in young- infants is

All '^.“""^/'“P ""d during wakeful-

ess. Al these facts prove the intimate association
between sleep and cerebral antemia

°f the factors-not
(instrad oVh'" factor_in the causation of sleep

Lsult of sf 7- the

sTeen rf '"I" f^et that it precedes

sleep. Thus by means of a special manometer

devised independently by Weir Mitchell and by
Hammond,* the state of the brain as regards its
blood contents can be accurately determined by

thr‘fln-7? 7 “P°»

her f *" apparatus. A num-

r ^^Pf^ents with this instrument showed
at the fall of the fluid, indicating a lessened
amount of blood, took place before tlte appearance

From another side Hilton pointed out that when
the base of the skull is fractured, it is only necessary
to compress the jugulars to cause the cerebro-spinal
■ quid to come out at the ears; while, as every surgeon
knows, m a fracture of this kind, it is only during the
waking state that the cerebro-spinal fluid flows out
Irom the ears ; during sleep it stops, or at all events

YorlnTsS^ Sra,;, R,s!, Ne„

* Hammond, Quarlerfy Journal of Psych. Sled, ami Med. furis-
trude7tce, January 1869.

EVIDENCE OF CEREBRAL AN.^MIA. 45

is greatly diminished. These facts prove indirectly
that sleep is accompanied, not by venous stasis,
but by contraction of the vessels, that is by cerebral
anaemia.

I have already referred to the direct proofs of
cerebral anaemia during sleep furnished by Tar-
chanoff’s experiments. This skilful investigator
studied directly the cerebral changes which occur
during natural sleep in young puppies, and satisfied
himself that normal sleep is constantly associated
with cerebral anaemia. Every time the puppy fell
asleep his brain became pale to a marked degree.
All young puppies easily fall asleep when placed in
a horizontal position, but Tarchanofif’s observations
show that they most easily fall asleep when the head
is raised, and that the only position in which they
will never go to sleep is when the head is depressed
below the body. It is evident that this absence of
sleep when the head is vertically below the body is
explained by stasis of blood in the vessels of the brain,
while the facility of sleep in the opposite position is
due to reflux of blood from the head, that is to say
to cerebral anaemia.

Thus we see that the evidence for the vasomotor
theory of sleep has demonstrated that during sleep the
cerebral vessels are contracted, and consequently con-
tain less blood. As Hammond, moreover, has pointed
out, the influence of cerebral anaemia in causing sleep
is also shown by the action of heat, which draws
the blood from the internal organs, including the brain,
to the skin, thus causing sleepiness ; by the action of
extreme cold, which has the same effects ; by the
action of digestion, which draws the blood to the large
abdominal vessels and thus produces somnolence •, and

SLEEP.

also by-the tendency to sleep which is well marked in
debility and after excessive loss of blood.

Durham believes^ that we must distinguish in the
brain two sorts of circulation : one associated with its
activity, the other with its nutrition. When the mind
IS active, during the first kind of circulation, the
capillaries dilate and give admission not only to the
serum but also to the red, oxygen-bearing corpuscles,
while at the same time endosmosis is increased by the
heightened rapidity of the blood; and the increased
endosmosis occasions naturally a greater flow into the
blood-stream of different products of plastic and
gaseous tissue-metamorphosis. At the same time
exosmosis is slackened, as he found in his observa-
tions on endosmosis and exosmosis in the intestines of
the rabbit. During the circulation of nutrition, on the
other hand, the blood-stream is slower, the capillaries
contracted, and the conditions are favourable to exos-
mosis, and consequently to the nutrition of the brain.
In Durham’s opinion these conditions are present
during sleep. Kohlschiitter expressed the same
opinion, comparing the circulation during cerebral
activity to that which takes place in the glands during
their activity (Claude Bernard).

While speaking of the vasomotor theories of
sleep I may mention the hypothesis formulated by
Girondeau. Its point of departure is to be found in
the discovery, by Boll and Robin, of the lymphatic
spaces round the cerebral vessels. Girondeau sup-
poses that these lymphatic spaces are filled with
lymph during sleep, and that the vessels are thus
compressed, and the circulation retarded. In these
lymphatic spaces or sheaths. Professor Boll has con-
stantly found white blood corpuscles in more or less

THE CHEMICAL THEORIES.

abundance, and if we bear in mind Professor Tarcha-
noff’s discovery that when animals are immobilised
by curare the white corpuscles accumulate in the
lymphatic spaces, we may understand why it is
that during prolonged hibernation the blood of
animals seems completely deprived of white cor-
puscles. It is evident that under these conditions the
same phenomena are produced as under the influence
of curare, and during prolonged hibernation the white
corpuscles probably accumulate in the lymphatic spaces
and channels. It is probable that such an accumula-
tion of lymph in the sheaths of the cerebral vessels
would possess a special significance as regards the
nutrition and plastic reproduction of the tissues, but
the question can only be completely cleared up by
further research.

Side by side with these vasomotor theories have
arisen the chemical theories of sleep. Thus Sommer
has attempted to prove that sleep is caused by im-
poverishment of oxygen in the brain, appearing as
soon as the reserve of oxygen in the tissues and
blood is exhausted. He connects his theory with
the fact, discovered by Pettenkoffer and Voit, that
the absorption of oxygen during the night is greater
than during the day, and that it is still further
increased by albuminous food. Heynsius, also, has
shown that during sleep absorption is more active
than in the waking state, but that the accumulation
of reserve albumen is retarded, and he explains this
by the faculty possessed by acids of retarding the
diffusion or exosmosis of albumen, for it is re-
cognised that fatigue always causes the formation of
lactic acid and other products of retrogressive meta-
morphosis, while the alkalis, as Heynsius has also

SLEEP.

Shown, _ accelerate albuminous osmosis. Prcyer' is

reef' ''5 the

t consequence of fatigue, or rather, of the fati<rue

rubst""^'' these being easily oxidisable

bff ““m required by the

bia n, and consequently that the artificial injection

actic acid and similar bodies causes sleep. Un-
for unately, experiments in this direction have only

Meyef etff’’ ^■

Others, and especially Professor Pfiuger, have
devoted their attention to the part played by car-
bonic acid during sleep. Pfifiger starts from the fact
that when the oxygen is used up and is replaced by
carbonic aad, activity ceases. The formation of
carbonic acid produces a series of violent oscillations
and explosions, exciting vibrations in all the atoms
around. He compares the process to what takes
place in singing flames, and referring to the grev
substance of the brain, remarks that it is in the
waking state that the vibrations are most powerful
and the singing of the flames loudest. Experiments
with frogs showed that as soon as the formation of
carbonic acid is arrested drowsiness and finally death
IS caused. It is the brain which requires most
oxygen, and when no longer maintained in activity by
the formation of carbonic acid sleep ensues. Pfliio-er
rneets the difficulty of the long duration of sleep after
the brain^ has recovered its oxygen, by contending
that the intra-molecular vibrations of the brain, like
the strings of a harp, continue to vibrate long after
the blow which has set them in motion, and this

^ Ueherdie Ursache des Schlafes, 1877; also art. “Schlaf,” Eulen-
burgs Real-Eneykiopadie, 2nd ed,, Bd. xvii.

THE AUTO-INTOXICATION THEORY. 49

is supported by the difficulty with which sleep is
obtained after severe exertion.^ Binz has also shown
that various soporifics (lactic acid, morphia, chloro-
form) display special affinity for the cerebral cortex ;
on account of this affinity the cortex fixes for a
certain period the soporific substances brought by
the blood, and in so doing becomes incapable of the
processes of dissociation needed to maintain the
waking condition.

An attempt has further been made to explain sleep
by the accumulation of leucomaines or poisonous
alkaloids in the tissues. This has especially been
done by Professor Leo Errera of Brussels, in commu-
nications made to the Brussels Society of Anthro-
pology in 1886, and again in 1895.^ He regards
sleep as essentially a process of physiological intoxi-
cation, taking as his point of departure the facts
ascertained by Bouchard and others as to the
existence of poisonous alkaloids in the urine and
saliva. “Work in the organism,” he points out, “is
indissolubly bound up with a chemical breaking
down. Among the products which result the leuco-
maines figure. Borne along by the blood, they are
without doubt retained by the cerebral centres, and
as many of them have a fatiguing and narcotic action,
they must at length produce fatigue and sleep. During
activity more leucomaines are formed by this break-
ing down than oxidation can destroy. But during
sleep they are destroyed and carried away. Their

^ A statement of Pfliiger’s theory may be found in the Lancet^ 19th
_ June 1875 ; also PHiiger’s Aichiv. f. d. Ges. Physiolog., x. pp, 658 et
seq., 1875.

Leo Eirera, Sur le Mecanisme du Sommeil^ Bruxelles, 1895.
Laupts has also argued in the same sense, Ann. Med.-psych., Nov

1895-

SLEEP.

oxidation products, having no special affinity for the
protoplasm of the grey substance, are washed
away by the blood-stream. The nerve cell is thus
cleansed, and a slight stimulus suffices to produce
awakening. Work, fatigue, sleep, reparation, and
awakening are thus not merely successive events, but
phenomena chained together in a regular and neces-
sary cycle. The alternations of waking and sleeping,
on this hypothesis, are like the rhythmic movements
of respiration, or the activity and repose of a muscle.”
It has been asked by Vanderkindere why, on the
chemical theory, excess of fatigue should prevent
sleep. Errera justly replies that the properties of
toxic substances vary according to the dose, and that
while in small doses they can produce narcosis, in
large doses they sometimes produce excitement or
even convulsions. But the theory does not explain
the power we possess of postponing sleep, or of
awaking at a fixed hour.

In recent years the chief theories of sleep have
been formulated by nerve histologists, who have
endeavoured to explain not so much the causes of
sleep as its ultimate nervous mechanism. Their
theories find some support in the phenomena of cell
fatigue as observed by Hodge and others. The first
of these theories which deserves mention is Rabl Riick-
ardt’s hypothesis of the neurospongium^ according to
which psychic processes are due to the rapid play of the
amoeboid protoplasmic prolongations of the nerve
cells, in perpetual conjunction and rupture of union ;
while sleep with its dreams, together with hypnotism,
etc., is accounted for by partial paralysis of these
amoeboid prolongations.^

^ Rabl Rlickardt, Neurolo^sches Centralhlatt, 1890, Ileft 7-

THE STATE OF THE BRAIN CELLS,

Two sections, A and B, from the first thoracic spinal ganglion of a
cat. B is from a ganglion which had been electrically stimulated
for some hours, A from the corresponding ganglion at rest. The
exhausted cells are shrunken. N., nucleus; N.S., nucleus of capsule;
V., vacuole; x 500 diameters (Hodge),

SLEEP.

A few years later Professor Lepine, in ignorance of
Rabl Rlickardt’s hypothesis, but stimulated by the
new methods and results of Golgi and Ramon y Cajal,
set forth a similar theory of more definite character.
He applied it in the first place to explain the alterna-
tions of sensorial anaesthesia, the state in which a
person becomes attentive to one point and insensible
to all other impressions, and he supposed that certain
cerebral cells in the normal state are able to break'
their communication with the periphery and shut
the door on importunate sensations. Sleep, whether
natural or provoked, would thus be explained by the
retraction of the ramifications of the cerebral cells,
and their consequent isolation and inactivity. He
explained the varieties of somnambulism on the
same hypothesis.^

Professor Mathias Duval has set forth a similar
theory, also independently; it has, however, attracted
far more attention than those already mentioned,
partly on account of the author’s reputation, partly
on account of the greater precision with which it
was worked out. Recalling Wiedersheim’s observa-
tions on the amoeboid movements of the nervous
cellules of a transparent crustacean, Leptodera hyalina,
Duval asked if we must not admit that the cerebral
neuron and its ramifications is not always compar-
able to an amoeba with its pseudopods, these ramifica-
tionselongating and retracting undervarious influences,
and so producing a more or less intimate contiguity
of the cerebral neurons. In sleep all these ramifications
are retracted. If the sleeper is feebly stimulated the
medulla responds by reflex reactions, but the brain
remains unre'^ponsive. Stronger stimulation reaches

^ Revue de Medecine, Paris, 1894, p. 727*

RAMON Y CAJAL’S THEORY. 53

the brain by means of chemiotropism — that is to say,
the intimate chemical processes set up by the pro-
ducts of metabolism^and the contacts so determined
in the extremities of the sensitive neurons ; chemio-
tropism sets up a current of contacts among the
pseudopods, and when this current has traversed and
shaken nearly the whole brain the sleeper awakes.^

Finally, Ramon y Cajal has started a theory which,
though suggested by Duval’s, has the advantage of
being supported by actually observed facts. It differs
from the preceding theories by transferring the seat
of chief activity to the neuroglia, and involves almost
a complete system of physiological mechanics. Cajal
regards the neuroglia as possessed of amoeboid
characters, by virtue of which it is enabled to act as
an isolator of the nervous currents. In their state of
relaxation the neuroglia pseudopodia extend and
intervene between the cells and their protoplasmic
processes and the nerve branches, so that the passage
of nerve currents is either entirely stopped or con-
siderably impeded. In this way, which the dis-
tinguished histologist of Barcelona admits to be
largely hypothetical, it is possible to explain the
process of natural repose and sleep, as welt as of
narcotics and hypnotism.^

Lately, Howell has set forth a modification of the
vasomotor theory of sleep (suggested by his own
plethysmographic investigations), which may be thus
stated in his own words ; — The immediate cause of
normal sleep lies in a vascular dilatation of the skin

^ Duval, “ Hypothese sur la physiologie des centres nerveux; theorie
histologique du sommeil,” Soc. de Biologic, 1895, p. 85.

^ Ramon y Cajal, Hipotesis sobre el mecanismo hisiologico de la
associacion del suevo y del eslado vigil, Madrid, 1895. Also His’s
Archiv. f. Anatomic, etc., 1895, Heft. 4-6.

SLEEP.

causing a fall of blood pressure in the arteries at the
base of the brain, and thereby producing an anaemic
condition in the cortex cerebri. This condition of
anaemia, in connection with the withdrawal of external
stimuli, causes a depression of the psychical processes
in the brain cells below the threshold of conscious-
ness. The fall of blood pressure is due, in the first
place, to a relaxation of tone in that portion of the
vasomotor centre controlling the skin vessels. The
immediate cause of normal awaking, on the contrary,
is found in the augmented flow of blood to the brain
that follows upon the gradual constriction of the skin
vessels as the vasomotor centre recovers its tone.
The periodicity of sleep is therefore directly connected
with a rhythmic loss and resumption of tone in the
vasomotor centre. Throughout the waking period
the vasomotor centre is under continual stimulation,
and is therefore in continual activity. Sensory im-
pulses, especially from the skin and the cutaneous
sense organs, are at all times falling into the central
nervous system in greater or less quantities, and
through a reflex pressor action on the vasomotor
centre these sensory impulses keep up a constant
activity of the centre, particularly of that part con-
trolling the skin vessels, as is indicated by the striking
effect of such stimuli upon the volume of a limb when
measured plethysmographically. Mental activity in
all its forms is accompanied by a similar pressor
effect upon the vasomotor centre, which is likewise
known to affect the skin circulation. During the
waking hours, therefore, the vasomotor centre is in
uninterrupted activity, and the result must be the
production of a condition of fatigue in this centre
proportionate to the amount of stimulation. If the

iiowell’s theory.

fatigue is sufficiently pronounced, the centre will
relax and sleep ensue, in spite of even strong sensory
or mental stimuli. If the fatigue is less marked, as
is normally the case at the end of a waking period,
adequate relaxation takes place only after the with-
drawal of sensory and mental stimuli, and our
voluntary preparations for sleep consist essentially
in devices to minimise these, stimuli. That the vaso-
motor centre is susceptible to fatigue, Howell believes
from his own experiments in the continuous stimu-
lation of sensory nerves (sciatic) in curarised and
narcotised animals. The great rise of blood piessuie
that results from such stimulation soon passes off
more or less completely, and that this result is owing
to fatigue of the centre rather than to fatigue of the
muscles in the walls of the blood-vessels is indicated
by the fact that the blood-vessels in the ear of a
rabbit may be kept in a condition of strong contraction
for a long period (over an hour at least) by constant
tetanic stimulation of the peripheral end of the
cervical sympathetic nerve. In addition to the effect
of the cerebral anaemia, Howell holds that an acces-
sory favouring' condition to the production of sleep
may be found in a certain degree of fatigue of the
parts of the brain mediating psychical processes.
Portions of the sensory and the association areas of
the cortex, using Flechsig’s nomenclature, must be
active during the greater part of the waking period,
and probably, therefore, lose their irritability to a
greater or less extent. ‘Upon the withdrawal of the
normal blood supply, their irritability will tend to
fall more quickly below the threshold of conscious-
ness in consequence of this fatigue. We might,
therefore, say that three factors combine to produce

sleep.

normal sleep: i. A diminution of irritability, caused
by fatigue, of large portions of the cortical area. 2.
Voluntary withdrawal of sensory and mental stimuli
involved in the preparations for sleep. 3. A dimin-
ished blood supply to the brain, owing to a relaxation
of tone in the vasomotor centre and the fall of
general arterial pressure thereby produced. The last
factor Howell regards as the immediate cause of
sleep, explaining its comparatively sudden and nearly
simultaneous occurrence over the entire cortex.^

If we except’ the largely hypothetical explana-
tions based on nervous histology, the chief theories
of slecp,^ as Wundt has pointed out, possess the
common defect that they neglect its fundamental and
direct cause. The blood-vessels were made for the
brain (as Crichton Browne well remarks), and not the
brain for the blood-vessels, and the amount of blood
in the brain is regulated by the functional activity of
the nervous tissues. According to Pfliiger’s theory,
again, sleep ought to affect the entire organism and
the whole central nervous system ; but, as we have
seen, that is not the case, for the spinal cord and the
nerves do not sleep. It is necessary, as Wundt has
shown, to distinguish the essential from the secondary
phenomena of sleep. With reference to the chemical
theories which explain the appearance of sleep by
the accumulation in the organism of the products of
fatigue, we must remember that mere boredom or
monotony, in the absence of all fatigue, is sufficient
to cause sleep. If we analyse this fact we realise that

^ W. H. Howell, “ A Contribution to the Theory of Sleep,” /our.
of Experimental Medicine, 1897.

^ For a bibliography of the theories of sleep see Sante de Sanctis, /
Sogni e il Sonno, 1896, pp. 48 et seq.

YAWNING.

ennui must induce sleep precisely because^ it removes
all the varied impressions and sensations which
stimulate our attention and supply ever new material
for the elaboration of thought.

This leads us to the phenomenon of yawning, which
occurs under the circumstances just described, and
may help to throw light on our present problem.
What is a yawn ? Externally, the yawn consists of a
slow and deep inspiration while the mouth is more
or less widely open, and it is followed by a slow
expiration which is accomplished with gaping
mouth and more or less contracted glottis, thus
producing the well-known sound which accompanies
every regular yawn. That is the external side of a
yawn. In its internal mechanism, according to Mosso,
it depends on a fatigue of attention. This explana-
tion is corroborated by the well-known fact that,
cceteris paribus, yawning appears most frequently in
invalids weakened by loss of blood, and also in
subjects with an unstable nervous system, for instance
the hysterical. In short, yawning appears most
readily when consciousness is feeble and quickly
fatigued. Thus many persons suffering from anae-
mia begin to yawn and grow sleepy when they
remain long in an upright position, either seated or
standing, and as soon as they assume a horizontal
position their yawns and desire for sleep dis-
appear. In presence of these facts, it is reasonable to
conclude that there must exist a more or less intimate
connection between yawning and cerebral anosmia.

Energetic yawning always accompanies stretching
of the body and limbs, and Mosso considers that the
latter movement is due to an instinctive desire to
avoid localised stasis of blood, and that, in general,

SLEEP.

we experience the need to stretch the limbs whenever
the blood is irregularly distributed throughout the
body.

That, however, yawning and stretching are really
due to fatigue of attention finds confirmation in my
investigations into the antagonism between attention
on one side and movement — indeed all motor inner-
vation— on the other. These investigations were
made in collaboration with Dr. Wartanoff, with the
aid of the graphic method. They have demonstrated
that all activity of attention is translated externally
by an afflux of blood to the brain, and corresponding
diminution in the volume of the arm; but if the
subjects be made to execute some habitual movement
(as with eyelids or tongue) the ordinary effects of
attention on the vessels of the body are abolished. It
was the same when the subjects concentrated their
attention on some minimal sensation of hearing or
touch while imagining some movement to themselves,
without, however, reproducing it; in that case also,
attention was not translated into a diminution in the
volume of the arm.^

These experiments proved to me that between
active attention and all sorts of movements and
motor innervations there is complete and absolute
antagonism, and consequently that yawning and
stretching may very well be due to the motor re-
action of the organism against prolonged attention.
On the other side, Ludwig Bohm has remarked that
every concentration of attention leads to squinting in

1 Marie de Manaceine, “ De 1 ’Antagonism e qui existe entre chaque
effort de I’attention et des innervations motrices,” A(ti del' XL
Congresso Medico (Rome, 1894), vol. ii ; also Archives italiennes de
Biologie,

MOVEMENT AND ATTENTION, ’ 59

persons having a predisposition to it. This is ex-
plained by the antagonism of motor innervations and
attention, because in squinting persons one group of
muscles are stronger than their antagonists, and con-
sequently the latter need a more powerful innervation
to keep them in activity, and as every concentration
of attention is opposed to movement and motor
innervations, squinting appears as the weaker
muscles cease to receive the necessary innervation.
It is for the same reason — i.e., because movement
destroys attention — that we cry or groan, move our
body or agitate our limbs, to lessen pain and dis-
comfort While attention is at its height it may
stifle movement, but as soon as it is fatigued the
reaction sets in and the need of movement shows
itself in reiterated yawns, in the desire to stretch the
body and limbs. Thus Mosso’s explanation of the
internal mechanism of yawning seems to be entirely
just.

We have already seen that an arrest of conscious-
ness may always be observed in the sleeper, and if
we wish to understand the nature and causation of
sleep on the psychic side we must study conscious-
ness itself. From this point of view the cause of
sleep may be stated in the formula : Sleep is the
resting-time of consciousness.

If this formula is correct, persons in whom con-
sciousness is little developed should sleep more than
persons endowed with a more pronounced and clearly
defined “ego,” since the development of the notion of
our ego is intimately and directly connected with
that of consciousness.

To study the phenomena of consciousness we must
first of all observe children, in whom the conscious

SLEEP.

side of psychic life is necessarily less developed than
in adults. Now sleep, as every one knows, lasts
longer in children, and they fall asleep much more
quickly and easily than adults. Among adults also,
in civilisation, we may observe that the least developed
and least cultured persons are those who need most
sleep. Confirmation may also be found in observa-
tions on savages, who, as Dugald Stewart remarked,
fall asleep as soon as they are unoccupied and nothing
in the external world fixes their attention. Miclucho-
Maclay once informed me that the Papuans sleep
much, falling into slumber as. soon as they have
nothing to do, and that in the strangest position^?,
not only when seated but also when upright. We
may note also that cretins, as, for instance, Brierre
de Boismont remarked, sleep excessively, and it is
unnecessary to observe that in them consciousness is
developed to an extremely feeble degree.

Finally, this hypothesis as to the nature of sleep
finds another proof in the fact, often demonstrated,
that animals deprived of their brains, and consequently
of all consciousness analogous to ours, never sleep.^
Fick has dealt with this subject, and Neumann
expressly points out that sleep is the less necessary
to an animal the more the spinal cord predominates

^ It must be added, however, that of recent years this has been
questioned. Thus Belmondo (“ Alcune Idee sui Processi chemici nel
Cervello, Archivio per I Aftlropologia, 1895) remarks that a sleeping
animal is not perfectly equal to an animal without a brain, “ and that
for the excellent reason that periodical sleep is not wanting in the
lower vertebrates, such as fishes, in which the brain is very slightly
developed and the psychic functions rudimentary, and also in animals
deprived of brains. This observation,” he continues, “first made by
Flourens, then by Schifif, by Goltz in his famous brainless dog, by Stefani
in pigeons, and confirmed by Baratynsky, I have myself repeatedly
observed in my [brainless] doves, which showed alternate periods of

BRAINLESS ANIMALS AND SLEEP.

over the brain, and refle.x movement over conscious
and voluntary movement.

To appreciate all the importance of this fact, it
must be remembered that animals deprived of the
brain must necessarily lack that marvellous faculty
which we call self-consciousness, which is conscious-
ness of all the various phenomena of psychic life.
In saying that the lower animals are without
consciousness, it is not meant that they are com-
pletely lacking in every form of consciousness, but
only that in them consciousness is in so slightly
differentiated a state, that it is impossible even to
divide their conscious and voluntary from their
unconscious and reflex actions, so that many authors,
including the illustrious Wundt, go so far as absolutely
to deny the existence of reflex movements in the
lower animals. It is true that every action and
movement, in order to become mechanical, must first
have been conscious and voluntary. The consciousness
of the lower animals is, however, so little developed
that it is impossible to distinguish it from other
psychic aptitudes. To understand this undifferen-
tiated psychic condition we must recall analogous
periods in the development of the psychic life of
organisms, as in those groups of animals in which

agitation and immobility which, however, were in direct relation with
the fulness or emptiness of the crop. When this is empty, and the
organism, although the cerebral hemispheres are absent, feels the vague
stimulation of hunger, the animal is agitated and restless; if fed it
becomes calm, closes the eyes, resumes the characteristic attitude
described by Dalton, and remains motionless for hours during digestion.
In brainless pigeons kept without food, the periods of agitation and
calm seem to me much less regular. But in any case, sleep is not a
purely cerebral function, as some believe; the whole organism sleeps,
and the brain also, in my opinion, only sleeps because the organs of
sense sleep.”

SLEEP.

the living protoplasm appears one and indivisible,
that is to say absolutely deprived of all differentiation
into separate organs and tissues, accomplishing by
itself every necessary function of life, — respiration,
movement, sensibility, absorption. It goes without
saying that under such conditions it is impossible to
imagine that this or that function of the protoplasm
can be completely fatigued, for all fatigue must be
generalised throughout the mass and occasion a
temporary arrest of all the vital functions. In
piesence of such facts it is natural to suppose that
periods of activity and repose must be strictly
balanced under these conditions, and that con-
sequently these forms of organic life have no need
of any accessory form of repose in the form of
sleep.

As soon as consciousness is differentiated from the
other psychic functions, it is so often put into action
that the periods of repose which regularly follow
periods of activity become insufficient for the com-
plete restitution of the exhausted energies of con-
sciousness, and sleep, in periods more or less lengthy
&nd frequent, becomes increasingly necessary. The
weaker consciousness is, the more easily it is fatigued
and in need of sleep; an energetic consciousness, on
the contrary, is contented with periods of sleep that
are shorter, less deep, and less frequent. I have
already referred to children, and would only add
that, as every one may observe, the younger children
are the more profoundly they sleep.

The meaning of the statement that sleep is the
resting-time of consciousness is well illustrated by
the observations made in 1828 on a certain Caspar
Hauser. This subject had passed his childhood and

CASPAR HAUSER.

part of his youth in absolute solitude, so that he had
never seen either men or animals, or plants, or the
sky, the sun, the stars, the moon. At seventeen or
eighteen years of age he was brought to Nuremberg
and abandoned in the middle of a street. At this age
his development was that of a baby, for he could
neither walk, see, nor speak, as was at once observed
by the people who found him, and verified by the
detailed observations of his teachers. So many varied
impressions and new sensations produced such a strong
effect on him during the first period of his life at
Nuremberg that he suffered considerably, and even
longed to be again shut up in the complete solitude
of the gloom}'’ little room in which he had passed so
many years of his life. Now this Caspar Hauser,
during the first months of his life among men, slept
so profoundly that it was almost impossible to awaken
him. He always fell asleep as soon as the sun set,
as easily as a baby, even more easily, for it was
enough to lead him outside the house to send him
to sleep, even when he was in a jolting vehicle, in
spite of the noise of the wheels and the movement.
His consciousness received so many new and unac-
customed sensations that it quickly became fatigued
and exhausted, and hence the irresistible tendency to
sleep.

If we wish to investigate this question further we
may study the phenomena presented in old people,
some of whom sleep much and soundly, while the
sleep of others, of the same age, is light or brief.

. These differences cannot be explained by the chemical
or vasomotor theories of sleep, for the products of
metabolism must still be formed, and at the same
time the vasomotor system must be modified by age.

SLEEP.

and yet sleep in these old people presents diametri-
cally opposite characters. But if we regard sleep as
the resting-time of consciousness these differences are
easily explained. In those old people whose con-
scious life grows feeble with the years, consciousness
must be quickly exhausted ; hence more or less
predominance of sleep. At the same time there is
a more or less notable enfeeblement of conscious
memory; thus Struve, the illustrious Russian astro-
nomer, during the last years of his life gradually
lost his memory for recent events, while well remem-
bering earlier events. As an example of the extent
to which sleep may predominate in old age, I may
mention the case of the French mathematician,
Moivre, who was continually obliged to increase the
time devoted to sleep, until at last he slept for twenty
hours a day, leaving only four for science and the
other occupations of conscious life.

On the other hand, old men who preserve their con-
sciousness in full vigour are subject to insomnia, as is
natural, for the conditions of old age are such that
consciousness has no occasion to exercise itself to the
same degree as in the past, and since it still preserves
its vigour intact in spite of the years, does not become
sufficiently fatigued to feel the need of long and pro-
found repose.

Thus the psycho-physiological statement which I
have formulated above seems to explain sufficiently
the modifications of sleep according to age and
individual development. I may also remark that
persons with very marked personality and highly
developed consciousness have relatively little need
of sleep, precisely because such a consciousness is
capable of producing considerable work. Thus \yc

THE NECESSITY FOR SLEEP. 6$

know that Humboldt, Mirabeau, Schiller, Frederick
the Great, and Napoleon slept very little.

After all that has been said, it is not surprising
that the capacity for sleep should be denied by many
authors to the foetus during intra-uterine life.

TAe Necessity for Sleep. — In the following chapters
we shall often find evidence of the truth of the state-
ment that sleep is the resting-time of consciousness.
Here I only wish to dwell for a short time on the
question whether general sleep is necessary. Con-
sidering that not only different organs and tissues,
but also various apparatus of the central nervous
.system are able to perform their functions during
sleep, we might conceive doubts as to the necessity
of sleep. And such doubts have actually been
raised, and sleep declared a useless, foolish, even
hurtful habit (Girondeau^). We have, therefore, to
inquire whether it is possible to do without sleep.

To this question we can give a positive answer, for
want of sleep is not even so well borne by animals as
want of food. Direct experiment has shown that
animals entirely deprived of food for twenty days,
and which have then lost more than half their weight,
may yet escape death if fed with precaution — that is
to say, in small amounts often repeated. On the
other hand, I have found by experimenting on ten
puppies that the complete deprivation of sleep for
four or five days (96 to 120 hours) causes irreparable
lesions in the organism, and in spite of every care
the subjects of these experiments could not be saved.
Complete absence of sleep during this period is fatal
to puppies in spite of the food taken during this

^ Girondeau, De la CirculatioJi ciribrale intime dans ses rapports
avec le sommeil, Paris, 18S6.

SLEEP.

time, and the younger the puppy the more quickly
he succumbed. In animals deprived of sleep for a
considerable period, we may observe a lowering of tem-
perature and a marked decrease in the number of the
red and white blood corpuscles, the latter no doubt
because arrested in the lymphatic channels. During
the last days of such an experiment the blood
becomes notably thickened, while the red corpuscles
and the amount of haemoglobin are increased. This
is due to the fact that eventually the animal refuses
to eat or drink, while the kidneys continue to act.
At the same time as the temperature of the body
begins to fall, the reflex movements that the animals
manifest on being pinched become more and more
enfeebled and slackened. These changes of reflex
movement show themselves periodically first on one
side of the body and then on the other, which might
indicate that the two hemispheres are, in these con-
ditions, acting in turn. The pupils become irregular,
the reactions slower, and there is a certain periodicity
in the phenomena observed ; that is, the pupil on the
side which shows itself insensible to irritations does
not react to light, this state of the pupil showing
itself periodically first on' one and then on the other
side of the body. At the same time serious derange-
ment of nutrition may be observed. As a rule, the
puppy deprived of sleep for three or four days presents
a more pitiful appearance than one which has passed
ten or fifteen days without food. I can speak from
observation, as I was obliged to make experiments
on the results of want of food as well as of sleep, and
I became firmly convinced that sleep is more neces-
sary to animals endowed with consciousness than
even food.

F.XPERIMENTS ON ENFORCED SLEEPLESSNESS. 6/

It is interesting also to note that in deprivation of
sleep it seems to be the brain which suffers most,
while m complete deprivation of food it is the brain
which longest preserves its normal weight and con-
stitution, the other organs and tissues undergoing
profound modification and remarkable diminution in
volume. Judging from experiments on puppies of
from two to four months old, we may conclude that
want of sleep acts primarily on the cerebral centres,
in which it provokes a series of pathological changes.^

These investigations have lately been carried a step
further by Professor Patrick and Dr. J. A. Gilbert, of
the Psychological Laboratory of the University of
Iowa. In view of the fact, as they remark, that our
knowledge of the physiological and mental effects of
enforced abstinence from sleep is solely confined to
my experiments on dogs, they resolved to experi-
ment on the human subject. Their subjects were
teachers in the University, and it was proposed to
keep them awake continuously for about 90 hours,
making physiological and psychological tests upon
them at intervals of 6 hours, in respect to reaction
time, discrimination time, motor ability, memory,
attention, etc.; to observe the general effects of
insomnia, and also the depth, amount, and character
of the sleep that finally resulted. This plan was
successfully followed with three subjects, who were
constantly attended by one or two watchers. The
first subject, an assistant professor at the University,
in perfect health, suffered much from sleepiness
. during the second night, the time of dawn being

^ Marie de Manacefne, “ Observations exp.^rimentales sur I’insomnie
absolue,” Ai'ch. ital. de Biologie, 1894. Also, Alii delP XI. Congresso
Medico (Rome), vol. ii., P'isiologia, p. 174.

SLEEP.

that of greatest somnolence, but not nearly so much
during the third night. In his case the most marked
effect (not seen in the other cases) was the presence of
hallucinations of sight; the air seemed full of dancing
particles like gnats — coloured, red, purple, or black —
which he would try to catch. He had never had
hallucinations before, and they disappeared entirely
after the experiment was concluded. In all three
cases there was a steady increase in weight during
the experiment, followed by a marked decrease after
sleep. (In my experiments the dogs were only
weighed at the commencement of the experiment
and after death; and it was then found that there
had been a decrease in weight ; it was, however, only
slight, from 5 to 13 per cent.) The dynamometer
showed a steady decrease in strength of both grip
and pull, regained after sleep. The reactions became
slower, except in one case. Acuteness of vision in all
three cases uniformly increased during the experiment,
dropping to below the normal after sleep. Memory
became very defective, and power of attention was
largely lost: one subject found it impossible to
commit to memory in twenty minutes what nor-
mally took him two minutes. In only one case did
it appear that there would have been danger in
prolonging the experiment over 90 hours; in this
case the temperature fell three degrees below normal
after a brisk walk in the cool morning air, but soon
rose again. The most interesting feature of the
experiment was the ease and rapidity with which
sleep brought complete restoration. The subjects
only found it necessary to make up from 16 to
35 per cent, of the time lost from sleep. This
was partly due to the greater depth of the resulting

THE EVILS OF SLEEPLESSNESS.

sleep, partly to the fact that even when apparently
awake the subjects were sometimes partially asleep;
thus, one reported a dream while he was standing up
gazing at a piece of apparatus. Analysis of the
urine showed that there was increased excretion
of nitrogen and phosphoric acid, relatively more of
the latter.^

Thus, although in man the effects of enforced
sleeplessness are less permanently injurious than in
dogs, the nature and gravity of these effects are now
established. Empirically they were known iri an-
tiquity, as well as in China, where forced deprivation
of sleep was a form of torture, and even of capital
punishment.

In presence ot this inevitable necessity of sleep for
beings possessed of a central nervous system, we are
forced to conclude that conscious life needs for its
accomplishment an expenditure of energy so intense
that while it is being effected the processes of nutrition
and the reconstitution of the tissue cannot be com-
pletely carried on, and that sleep — the repose of con-
sciousness— is needed for the plastic nutrition of the
organism and the accomplishment of its vegetative
life. Self-consciousness is the highest of our faculties,
that which renders possible a moral ideal and scien-
tific knowledge ; it is not, therefore, surprising that
conscious life should require the greatest effort of
the organism, and that when consciousness is wanting
sleep becomes useless.

At the same time we must remember that sleep
is not an absolute arrest of cerebral activity. The

1 Professor Patrick and Dr. J. A. Gilbert, “On the Effects of Loss
of Sleep,” Psychological Review, September 1896. Full tables of
results for each subject accompany the paper.

SLEEP.

biain remains partially active, only sleeping in so
far as it is the anatomical basis of full consciousness
Byron was certainly right when he said that our life
is composed of two distinct existences, for sleep is a
world apart :

“ Our life is twofold ; sleep has its own world,

A boundary between the things misnamed
Death and Existence: sleep has its own world.”

It is necessary to study seriously and fundamenta’ly
this part of life, for on that study depends the solution
of other essential questions of our existence.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY. 75

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76 SLEEP.

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P.IRLIOGRArilY. 77

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of Experhnenial Medicme, 1897.

CHAPTER II.

THE PATHOLOGY OF SLEEP.

Brief and Inter jnitient Sleep — Complete Insomnia— The Con-
ditions of Inso7nnia— Afflux of Blood to the Bram—Insom7iia
a77t07ig the AncB77tic — ll7ico7isciousness exclicdes Inso77inia —
Division of Conscious7tess causes Inso77inia—Sti77tulation
of Consciousness as a cause of lnso7)inia—Why Pains
and Neuralgias disappear during Sleep — Hypnotics and
A7UBsthetics— Syncope— Excessive tendency to Sleep— Pa7-t
played, by the Sensati07is — Infitie7ice of Day and Night i7i
Inanition — Hiber7iatio7t — Su77i77ier Sleep — Narcolepsy-
Endemic Narcolepsy in Africa— Metabolis7n weakened in
Narcolepsy— E7ifeeble77ie7tt of Sensibility— The Cataleptic
State — Napoleon's Fits of Narcolepsy — Treatment of
Narcolepsy — Absence of Dreams during the Narcoleptic
Sleep — The f7'eque7icy of Convulsive Disorders during
Sleep — Automatism — Consciousness a7id Atte7ition — hi-
jurious influence of Prolonged and Monotonous Occupations
— Heightened Reflex Activity — Automatism — Suggestion
and Psychic Epidemics — Latah — Hypnosis a pathological
form of Sleep — Somnambulism — State of the Sensory Organs
during Somnambulism — Hysterical Somnolence — Double
Personality — Its possible Explanation — The Theory of the
Double Brain.

When we come to study the pathology of sleep,
we are met at the outset by the question : In what
do the pathological modifications of sleep consist?
If we consider any bodily function we always
find that the morbid changes are translated into
enfeeblement or over-excitement of action. In sleep,
similarly, we may find either weakened or excessive
activity, and we will consider the former case first.

INSOMNIA.

Insomnia. — When the power of sleep is weakened
it becomes light and fugitive, so that the slightest
noise, the least impression from without, may suffice
to waken the sleeper. Such sleep is obviously
hurtful, since the nutrition of the tissues must be
interrupted when it is scarcely begun, and is never
allowed to proceed in peace. The injurious effects
of this sleep have been noted by various authorities,
especially Bouchut. Such broken sleep is often
observed in persons who laugh and cry easily, who
frequently blush, and whose pulse is quickened by
the most insignificant cause, or even by no obvious
cause at all ; it is found, in a word, in those subjects
in whom the nervous system is ill-balanced and the
vasomotor apparatus extremely irritable.

Most cases of insomnia belong to this class, and
Hammond rightly warns physicians not to attach too
much faith to the assertions of patients who maintain
that they are entirely without sleep, for such subjects
are usually suffering not from absolute insomnia, but
from insufficient sleep. Complete insomnia is very
injurious to the health of the whole organism, and
especially of the brain, and psychic derangement,
more or less serious, may result (Renaudin).

Cases of complete insomnia are, however, met, but
they quickly terminate in deatK Such cases have
been described by Hammond, who observed, for
instance, in one patient complete absence of sleep
during nine days ; on the ninth day death put an end
to his sufferings. After the experiments on animals
and men already quoted, this fatal result cannot
astonish us.

Under what conditions is insomnia usually ob-
served ? We have already seen that it is common

SLEEP,

in subjects with an unbalanced and irritable nervous
system. Such subjects are characterised by a marked
tendency to hyperaemia of the head ; they blusli
frequently, an indication that the blood is flowing
towards the head (Bouchut, Nagel).

In analysing the conditions of sleep we have found
that, above all, a certain degree of anaemia of the
brain is necessary; it is easy to understand, therefore,
that persons who are liable to a flow of blood to the
head are at the same time liable to insomnia. And
at the other extremity an undue cerebral anaemia or
extreme depression of the general arterial tension
will also produce sleeplessness. This has been well
shown by the experiments of Maurice de Fleury,
using Verdin’s sphygmometer applied to the radial
pulse. He found that if in the waking condition the
normal arterial pressure was equal to 17 centimetres
of mercury, during calm sleep the pressure sunk to
II cm. If the pressure was a little above or a little
below this amount the sleep was partial or restless, or
disturbed by dreams. If the pressure was still more
abnormal — for example at 20 to 25, or at 4 to 6 — there
was complete insomnia, such as is found among the
insane or the extremely anaemic.^

Excessive intellectual labour is a recognised cause of
insomnia, as also is over-strain due to physical work
(Mahomed). Facts of this kind explain themselves,
since all over-strain, especially if cerebral, may
provoke a dilatation of the vessels of the brain so
considerable, that in the absence of corresponding
nutrition of the tissues it takes the form of a
temporary paralysis of the blood-vessels (Durham) ;
in this case the vessels of the brain are incapable of

^ Maurice de Fleury, V hisomnie et son Traiiement, 1S94.

CAUSES OF INSOMNIA.

contracting-, and the lymphatic channels surrounding
them are not supplied with nutritive lymph. In my
work on mental over-strain ^ I have already had
occasion to analyse the insomnia which develops
under the influence of an excessive dilatation of the
cerebral vessels by the weakening of the tone of the
vessel walls.

Extreme physical fatigue may also produce in-
somnia, and Mahomed supposes that under these
conditions the insomnia is due to stronger action of
the heart, which consequently sends a more con-
siderable amount of blood to the brain. In a subject
he observed the blood pressure increased notably after
the excessive physical work involved in a walk of
500 miles. This subject could not sleep until his
heart had begun to beat more tranquill\’.

Eustace Smith has mentioned that cold often
causes an attack of sleeplessness even in young
children, who generally enjoy excellent and profound
sleep. It is evident that in adults the same conditions
may much more easily produce insomnia, as is natural
when we remember that cooling of the extremities
always involves a greater flow of blood to the internal
organs, among others the brain.

After what has been said it will be understood how
every considerable stimulus— such as intense joy or
anxiety — may occasion insomnia when felt towards
evening. Russell’s observations showing that prisoners
lose much weight during the trial but not after the
sentence, however severe it may be, will not surprise
us when we know that any anxiety or agitation may
render impossible the sleep that is required for
the nutrition of the tissues and the restoration of

’ Marie de Manaceine, Le Surfnhiage Menial, Paris, 1890, ch i

SLEEP,

what is lost by the organism during ilic waking
hours.^

There can be no doubt that insomnia develops
under the influence of all the feelings and emotions
which, like joy, anger, or anxiety, cause a flow of
blood to the brain (Handfield-Jones, Lidell, etc.). A
physical cause may act in the same way, and the
Marquise de Ch^telet, in writing her memoir Sur
la Nature du Feu, combated her fatigue by plung-
ing her hands in ice-cold water, a method, indeed,
which is widely known and which acts by send-
ing the blood to the head. On the same principle,
various authorities have successfully treated in-
somnia by the application of cold compresses to the
head, or by enveloping the entire body in wet sheets
(Becker and Schlillcr). I have myself obtained ex-
cellent results, in cases of insomnia due to mental
over-strain, by applying an india-rubber bottle of cold
water to the forehead.

All these methods act favourably on insomnia
because, on the one hand, they provoke contraction of
the cerebral vessels, or, on the other, dilatation of the
vessels of the skin, and thus determine a secondary
and consecutive contraction of the vessels of the brain.
It is thus that hot baths taken at night cause sleep by
producing dilatation of the peripheral vessels of the
skin and consequently relative anaemia of the brain.

Observations on anemic persons are of special
interest from the present point of view, as they show

1 J. Russell, “ On Sleeplessness,” Brit. Med. Journal, so\. ii., i86i.
I may also mention the case reported by Solberg of a boy of eight who
developed insomnia as a result of anxiety caused by his approaching
examinations. The insomnia resulted in a serious illness {Allgem.
Zeitschrifl fur Psychiatrie, 1871).

TREATMENT OF INSOMNIA.

that the anaemic experience more or less sleepiness
when they are standing, but when they go to bed the
horizontal position alone often suffices to disperse the
tendency to sleep and bring on insomnia. This may
easily be explained. The blood-vessels in anaemia
are lacking in tonicity, and consequently in the hori-
zontal position the blood settles in too great amount
in the head, while in the vertical position there is a
stasis of blood in the lower limbs and the abdominal
organs. It is also recognised that some anaemic
subjects fall asleep immediately after eating, a fact
which is explained by the experiments of Durham,
who showed that the introduction of food into the
stomach caused a well-marked contraction of the
cerebral blood-vessels. It will be necessary to return
to this subject in the following chapter.

The application of electricity to the head may also
remove the tendency to insomnia (Beard and Rock-
well) by causing contraction of the cerebral vessels.
Hammond obtained marked tendency to somnolence
by galvanising the sympathetic nerve ; at the same
time the retinal vessels contracted, and, consequently,
the cerebral vessels; for, although the fact is dis-
puted, there is some reason to believe that there
is a certain amount of correspondence between
the retinal circulation and the cerebral circulation
(Rouchut). Hughlings Jackson, " examining the
retinal ve.ssels of waking or semi-sleeping children
by the ophthalmoscope, has found that they varied
considerably, being sometimes contracted, some-
times large, but they were contracted when the
child was somnolent or sleeping, while repeated
awakenings were alv/ays accompanied by dilatation.

Thus we see that not only is normal sleep accom-

SLEEP.

pan;ed by anaemia of the brain and contraction of the
cerebral vessels, but that whenever there is a flow of
blood to the head insomnia results. So that if sleep
represents the resting-time of consciousness, conscious-
ness demands, above all, a considerable flow of blood
to the head. It seems almost superfluous to cite any
further proof of this statement. I may, however,
recall a few well-known facts ; such as the abolition
of consciousness which follows a considerable loss
of blood, the enfeeblement of consciousness which
occurs in goitre, or enlarged thyroid, long since noted
by Schroder van der Kolk, the gland withdrawing
blood from the brain. All cretins are goitrous and
suffer from vascular impoverishment of the brain.
To the same order of facts belongs an observation, by
Dickson, of a very anaemic boy who, when standing
or sitting, showed a remarkable degree of sleepiness
and mental weakness, but when placed in the hori-
zontal position became more lively and intelligent.

Thus the exercise of consciousness requires an
active circulation of blood, all the more active since
it must necessarily be reflected in the function of
other organs. Experiments with the dynamometer
have shown that muscular force is notably weakened
when the subject is absorbed in conscious mental
work, such as the solution of an arithmetical problem
(Loeb). It is also recognised that mental work is
injurious after dinner, simply because all conscious
mental work causes a flow of blood to the brain
and consequently interrupts the normal course of
digestion by producing a relative anaemia of the
digestive organs.

It remains to show under what mental conditions
insomnia is observed. The intimate connection of

INSOMNIA IN NEURASTHENIA. 85

sleep and consciousness is illustrated by the fact,
among others, that there is absolute absence of
insomnia in the unconscious state. Abolition of
consciousness, from whatever cause, always throws
the subject into a state which, in appearance, re-
sembles sleep, but is distinguished from it in many
essential particulars. This semblance of sleep is
equally well observed in cases in which the abolition
of consciousness is caused by a shock to the brain, as
in those in which it is the result of haemorrhage into
the cerebral substance, or excessive v'^enous stasis.
Insomnia is thus impossible in the unconscious
state.

On the other hand, it is alleged that the most re-
bellious and complete inso'mnia is observed in mental
disorders, and especially in disorders characterised by
an apparent doubling or division of consciousness, a
lack of unity in self-consciousness. This is natural,
for the division of consciousness must be associated
with a loss of unity in its functional basis, and con-
.sequently it can only be active at certain parts; the
general fatigue of consciousness thus becomes im-
possible; and as sleep is only the repose of fatigued
consciousness, in such cases the divided consciousness
only in part grows weary and sleeps, and thus an
obstinate insomnia results.

In persons suffering from neurasthenia partial
insomnia may often be observed; at the same time
their consciousness is often doubled, or divided in
several parts, losing all unity. Such persons often
change their opinions and convictions, their sym-
pathies and antipathies, though the lack of unity
in their consciousness never reaches the intensity
observed in persons afflicted by mental diseases;

SLEEP.

their insomnia also is much less than among the
insane.^

Insomnia is also observed in cases of extreme
excitement, as, for instance, after considerable mental
effort or excessive anxiety; under such conditions
conscious thought works actively, seeking to divine
all possible unfavourable contingencies and to find
the best methods of defeating them.

Insomnia often depends on intense physical pain.
Such cases also illustrate the proposition that sleep
is the resting-time of consciousness, for when a painful
stimulus becomes sufficiently strong to reach con-
sciousness sleep is impossible, for an actively waking
consciousness cannot simultaneously repose. It is
thus that we generally find the most various pains
disappear when sleep comes, precisely because of the
abolition of consciousness during sleep. According
to the eminent American neurologist, Weir Mitchell,
all varieties of neuralgia are rarest between mid-
night and seven o’clock in the morning, the hours
chiefly devoted to sleep. Erichsen has remarked
that those who are asleep during a railway accident
are more apt to escape shock to the nervous system
than their less fortunate waking fellow-passengers.
Cases are quoted in medical literature, especially
by Hammond, in which necessary operations have
been performed on persons asleep under the in-
fluence of great fatigue. In such cases the opera-

1 Neurasthenia is, however, one of the chief causes of insomnia when
we put aside insanity. Macfarlane finds that of 167 cases of insomnia
(71 in men and 96 in women), 19 were due to neurasthenia, 19 to
chronic gout, 17 to overwork, 17 to worry, 10 to alcoholism, 10 to
non-gouty dyspepsia, 8 to the menopause, etc. The most usual age of
these cases was between 40 and 50- (-^* M^icfarlane, Insonuud

and its 7 he/ apeniics, 1S90. )

THE ACTION OF NARCOTICS. ^7

tion is effected without the patient's knowledge.
Whenever we awake under the influence of pain, as
for instance, toothache, it seems to us generally
that the pain revives after we have awakened; this
illusion is due to the fact that consciousness has
now become active, and consequently able to per-
ceive the full force of painful irritations.

The connection of painful sensations with con-
sciousness is also illustrated by the effects of the
so-called narcotics and anaesthetics, such as opium,
chloral hydrate, chloroform, etc. These drugs, and
others of the same class, diminish pain only by
reason of their enfeebling action on consciousness,
which in' certain doses they may temporarily annihi-
late, and as sleep also consists in a temporary arrest
of consciousness, these drugs have been called
hypnotics.^

If we examine the matter, however, we soon realise
that the action of narcotics presents none of the
characters observed during normal sleep, except one
only, the temporary arrest of consciousness. We
may also remark that, like normal sleep, the state of
narcosis may be interrupted by a very strong painful
stimulus which recalls consciousness into activity.
For this reason the surgeon requires a deep and
prolonged state of anaesthesia in order to perform a
major operation. Cases are also known in which
men whose consciousness was enfeebled by the fumes
of alcohol have been suddenly restored to the sober
state by the influence of pain, as from a broken bone

^ It would be out of place to enter here into a discussion of the
therapeutics of hypnotic drugs. An able summary of the character and
effects of the various narcotics and hypnotics will be found in the article
by Ringer and Sainsbury on “ Sedatives ” in Tube’s Did. of Psych.
Med.

SLEEP.

(Erasmus Darwin). In short, the effect of narcotics
only resembles sleep by producing a temporary
interruption of consciousness. At that point the
resemblance ceases, and observations on morphia-
maniacs and opium-eaters, who have grown so
accustomed to their narcotic that they cannot sleep
without it, even seem to show a certain antagonism
between the action of narcotics and sleep; otherwise
it is difficult ta explain why the habitual use of such
drugs should lead to the loss of the power of normal
sleep.

It must not be forgotten, also, that those persons
who sleep more than is necessary, gradually become
accustomed to this excess of sleep, so that at length
it becomes absolutely necessary to them, and the act
of falling asleep becomes constantly more easy. We
might imagine that this would apply to the drugs
called hypnotic or soporific (morphia, chloral, etc.),
if such drugs were really sleep-bringing; but experi-
ence .shows that this is not so; the prolonged use of
such drugs renders sleep impos.sible without their aid,
and at the same time sleep becomes more and more
refractory to these effects, so that the dose must be
continually augmented, until the victim at last cannot
dispense with the drug, either waking or sleeping,
although it is undermining both his physical and
mental health. To appreciate the value of normal
well-developed consciousness it is sufficient to look
at a single morphinomaniac or opium-eater. Such
subjects show, under the influence of repeated
enfeeblement of consciousness from the use of their
favourite drug, a progressive destruction of physical,
mental, and moral health, precisely because the
habitual use of narcotics has rendered impossible

SYNCOPE.

both the active work of consciousness and normal
sleep, with the nutrition and repair which are accom-
plished during sleep. It is evident that narcotic sleep
cannot be identified with the normal and natuial

sleep of a healthy organism.

In the same way syncope may produce a tempor-
ary interruption of consciousness, but there is nothing
in common between syncope and sleep, for in syncope
we observe a. simultaneous depression of the cardiac,
respiratory, and nutritive activity. The resemblance
between syncope and sleep is reduced to this, that in
both we find an interruption of consciousness due to
anaemia of the brain; and for this reason we treat
faintness successfully by methods adapted to provoke
hyperaemia of the brain, as, for example, by placing
the fainting person in such a position that the head
is lower than the body, or the method of Benham and
Notley, who have shown that while the plunging of
all the body except the head into a hot bath will
produce a tendency to faintness, this is soon averted
if the head also is plunged into the hot water, and
that hence the application of heat to the head will

avert an attack of syncope.^

We have to recognise, therefore, that not every in-
terruption of consciousness constitutes noimal sleep ,
besides this interruption and the presence of cerebral
anaemia, it is also necessary that there should be
active nutrition of the tissues, and apparently also
active blood formation, for it is asserted that the
more considerable the number of red blood cor-
puscles, and the stronger and more resistant they
are, the less necessary is sleep (Byford, Durham,
etc.).

Lancet ^ March 141I1 and 2i;l, itS5-

SLEEP.

Excessive Sleep. — We must now turn from the con-
sideration of insomnia to those morbid states which
are characterised by excess of sleep. I have already
pointed out that persons with feebly developed con-
sciousness sleep much, because a feeble consciousness
is easily and quickly fatigued. This is the case with
children, savages, cretins, and people of Inferior intel-
ligence, who sleep much and fall asleep as soon as
they have no occupation. There can be no doubt
that the development of consciousness is always more
or less parallel with that of individuality, of the
interna.1 ep-o, so that it is not surprising that persons
of strong will and clearly marked individuality sleep
relatively little.

To realise the feeble development of individuality
in cretins, for example, it is 'sufficient to examine the
expression on their faces, which by no means neces-
sarily corresponds with that of the feeling which
animates them, and is sometimes even in opposition
to it, so that they may smile when they are angry or
sad. In little children, also, one may sometimes
observe, though to a slighter extent, the same lack
of harmony between expression and feeling. Claye
Shaw has observed the same peculiarity In the
insane.^

If we realise that persons with feeble consciousness
need much sleep, we may understand how it is that
the same tendency is observed in many diseases, and
that the anaemic are somnolent, as are the subjects
of leucaemia and of the strange disease known as
myxoedema, for in all these morbid states conscious-
ness is weakened, in the anaemic and leucaemic on
account of the abnormal condition of the blood, and

^ Si. Bartholomew'' s Hospilal Reports., iS74> vol. x.

EXCESSIVE. SLEEP. 9 ^

in the myxoedematous on account of the formation
all over the surface of the body of a mucous tissue,
mucine, which envelops the peripheral nervous ap-
paratus and the nervous channels, stifling them, and
isolating them from a large proportion of exterior
impressions. At the same time myxcedematous sub-
jects experience an increasing apathy, a growing
heaviness of all fbc mental faculties, and this deaden-
ing of the intelligence is so marked that many
authorities have regarded this disease as a sporadic
idiocy — that is to say, a form of idiocy developing in
subjects formerly normal. The character of these
patients is also wholly modified, and consequently
their consciousness, and they become more and more
somnolent. It is not necessary to point out that the
diminution of sensibility to impressions from the
external world found in these patients, must act on
the psychic life as well as on the nutrition of the
organism generally.

The immense importance of the amount of the
impressions coming from the surrounding world to
maintain consciousness in a state of wakefulness,
is shown by Striimpelfs famous; case of general
anaesthesia. In this case a shoemaker’s assistant,
sixteen years of age, who was blind in one eye and
deaf in one ear, became anaesthetic over the entire
surface of the body, the sensibility of the skin being
thus entirely abolished. It was only necessary to
close his healthy (right) eye and stop his normal
(left) ear, and in two or three minutes he would fall
into a deep sleep. Receiving no impressions from
without, and at the same time possessing but a poor
and limited psychic world, he could not find within
him.sclf sufficient images and ideas to furnish con-

SLEEP.

scioiisness with the materials nccessar\' to maintain
its activity.^

VVe may understand the importance of sensations
for the development of consciousness, and of the
nervous system generally, by recalling for example
the investigations of Lombroso, which have proved
that the more refined and developed the senses are,
the more intelligent is the subject.^ The same fact
is illustrated by Itard’s observations, which show
that deaf-mutes never attain the same degree of
intelligence as wholly normal subjects, that their
feelings are always more sluggish, and, what is more
interesting, that the enfeeblement produced in deaf-
mutes by the absence of sensations of hearing and
of speech itself, is also reflected on their normal
organs of sense, that they are less sensible to various
painful impressions, and easily support such painful
operations as the extirpation of ingrowing toe-nails,
the setting of broken bones, etc.

From the present point of view this may easily
be understood, for where consciousness is feebly
developed, painful sensations must be feebly felt.
It is less easy to explain why, with this general
enfeeblement we also observe a much slighter im-
pressionability to the influence of drugs; it has,
however, been found that deaf-mutes, for instance,
do not react at all to ordinary doses of the strongest
purgatives. Other observations seem to show that

^ Pfliiger’s Archiv. f. die Gesammie Fhysiologie, 1887, Bd. xv. ; also
Adolf Striimpell, Ein Beitrag ztir Theorie des Schlafes. Other similar
cases have been recorded by Heinrich Witte (Inaug. Diss., Leipzig,
1894), 3.re summarised in Journal of Mental Science, April 1896.

- Lombroso e Ferrero, La Donna Delinquente, 1894 (French edition,
La Femme Criminelle el la Prostiluce, 1896 ; abridged English
edition, The Female Offender, 1896).

CAUSES OF EXCESSIVE SLEEP. 93

the blind also show a certain enfeeblemcnt of
the central nervous system, and, parallel with this
diminution of conscious life, a slower metabolism.
This slackening of nutritive changes is so con-
siderable that a blind animal loses much less weight
by starvation than a seeing animal.

It is scarcely necessary to add that both deaf-mutes
and the blind have less need of sleep than normal
persons, but both this question and that of metabolism
in those deprived of the various sense-organs still
need careful and detailed investigation to be definitely
settled. In any case, however, experiments on animals
left without food have shown that during the process
of starvation they lose much more of their weight
by day than by night ; and this difference has been
observed even in those cases in which the subjects of
the experiment were placed, both by day and by
night, in darkness, in tin boxes with lids of the same
metal. In these experiments the boxes were so
arranged that the animals submitted to starvation
were placed in such a way that they could not move
to any great extent, and the subjects chosen for experi-
ment were rabbits, that is to say animals accustomed
to be awake during the night; therefore the difference
in loss of weight must be due to the greater number
of exterior impressions received during the day, the
noisy occupations of daily life reaching the animals
enclosed in their tin boxes. Sleep thus played no
part in these experiments (Wjatcheslaw and Mana-
c^ine).

It is also recognised that prolonged starvation in-
duces more or less marked sleepiness, and we thus
reach the conclusion that the tendency to sleep is
increased and reinforced in all disorders in which

SI.KKI'.

there is a more or less marked enfeeblement of con-
sciousness; it is a matter of indifference whether the
diminution of consciousness depends on an abnormal
composition of the blood (anaemia or leucaemia), the
abolition of sensibility, the destruction of the organs
of sense, or the general exhaustion of the animal
organism in consequence of grave disease or in-
sufficient nutrition.

Hibernation and Prolonged Sleep. — The tendency
to sleep may be so strong in some cases that both
animals and men may sleep for many days, weeks,
and even months. Among animals we meet with
winter-sleep and with summer-sleep. Winter-sleep,
or hibernation, is observed in mammals, such as bat.s,
marmots, hedgehogs, etc., which fall asleep when the
cold weather begins and awake on the return of
spring. The animal loses its heat to a very marked
extent, although the temperature of its body always
remains rather higher than that of the surrounding
air. Metabolism greatly diminishes during winter
sleep, and at the same time there is a slackening of
the respiration and of the cardiac respiration, as well
as a kind of muscular immobility, a sort of figidity.
When hibernating animals are brought into a warm
room they awake, and their temperature rapidly rises
(Saissy, Horwath, Quinke, etc.).

The phenomenon of hibernation has frequently
been investigated, but its essential nature remains
unexplained. Li^bault and Forel regard it as an
autohypnosis. Blandet considers that it is a vestige
from a very remote epoch when the winters on our
planet were so severe that animals involuntarily fell
asleep during the winter,' because that was their only
chance of survivin|^ the wirit&f cold, 'but that as the

IIIISERNATION.

climate gradually grew milder the winter sleep
became rarer, and will finally disappear from the
surface of the globe.

It must be observed that among marmots, and
probably also among hedgehogs, there are individual
differences in hibernation, some individuals sleeping
longer and more deeply than others; among marmots
we may even find some which do not hibernate at all,
at all events in captivity. This difference is evidently
due to a difference in neuro-cerebral organisation.
We must conclude, therefore, that among marmots
cerebral consciousness varies, and that some in-
dividuals are what we may call strong-minded.

Summer-sleep is observed in hot countries among
cold-blooded animals who cannot support a very high
temperature of the surrounding air (Pfluger). In
summer-sleep the muscular system is in a peculiar
state resembling rigidity. So far as I am aware, no
experiments have yet been made on metabolism in
animals in the state of summer-sleep.

Before proceeding to the question of prolonged
sleep in human beings, we may pause to consider how
it is that such opposed influences as the harsh cold of
a severe winter and the stifling heat of a tropical
summer can cause the same result of exaggerated
somnolence and deep sleep. If the somniferous
influence of winter was manifested exclusively on
warm-blooded animals and the somniferous influence
of heat exclusively on cold-blooded animals there
would be little difficulty, for we might then suppose
that the influence of cold and heat depends on special
qualities of the organisation of warm-blooded^ animals
on one side and cold-blooded animals on the other.
The question cannot, however, be so simply answered.

and every one has probably had occasion to verify on
himself the somniferous action of cold as well as of
heat. Strictly speaking, however, there is here no con-
tradiction, for both cold and heat act in the same way
by provoking a dilatation of the peripheral vessels of
the skin, and consequently an afflux of blood to these
vessels. Any one may recognise the truth of this
statement by recalling that the most uncovered and
least protected parts of the body, the face and hands,
redden under the influence of heat as well as of severe
cold. It is obvious that if the surface vessels dilate
there will be less flow of blood to the brain, and con-
sequently more or less somnolence, resulting from the
cerebral anaemia thus produced; diminution of blood
in the brain thus weakening consciousness and render-
ing it inactive.

Narcolepsy. — We must now turn to the question of
prolonged and abnormal sleep in the human subject,
that is to narcolepsy. Such sleep for the most part
only occurs in isolated cases, but it is sometimes
found in various countries as an endemic disease,
being there known as the sleeping sickness, hypnosia
(Dangain), and by various other names. It seems to
have been first observed by Winterbottom, in 1819,
as being very common among the slaves in the Bay
of Benin, on the west coast of Africa; in 1840, Clark
found it common in Sierra Leone among the free
Africans ; and by other observers it has been found
on the Niger, in the Antilles, etc. Its endemic area
extends from Senegal to the Congo, in the Sierra
Leone district and the Hinterhmd^ especially in the
valley of the Congo; only negroes are affected, and
there are more cases inland than on the coast.
According to various English medical observers

NARCOLEPSY.

(Mason, Hood, Fergusson, Gore, Forbes), this strange
pathological sleep usually manifests itself after pro-
longed and fatiguing work which has exhausted the
subject’s strength. The result, which is the same
whether the work was physical or mental, is death.
It has been observed that this prolonged sleep is
very often met with in persons of feeble and
irregular mental activity, of undeveloped conscious-
ness. It is first manifested by enlarged lymphatic
glands (which the natives are accustomed to treat
by excision) and persistent drooping of the eyelids.
At first the subjects, who are usually young adult
males, can be roused, but the periods of sleep become
longer and more frequent, until at last sleep is almost
continuous, food is refused, and emaciation and ex-
haustion lead to death, in the course of weeks or
month<5. The mental faculties often seem to clear up
just before final extinction. In fatal cases of African
narcolepsy, Fergusson found that the brain was
anaemic and unusually firm; and inflammation of
the brain membranes is also found.^

In Europe narcolepsy usually consists of an irre-
sistible tendency to sleep, sometimes developing in
consequence of a considerable loss of blood, of a
painful emotion, of excessive fatigue, etc.; but some-
times also without any traceable cause. An abnormal
sleep of this kind may last for several days, weeks, or
even months without intermission. It is for the most
part impossible to awaken such subjects, and even if
awakened they soon fall asleep again. Metabolism
is evidently decreased during narcolepsy, as during
the hibernation of animals ; this conclusion is war-

See, for example, C. Forbes, “ The Sleeping Sickness of West
Africa,” Lancet^ 12th May 1894.

SLEEP.

ranted by the fact that individuals who are plunged
into this prolonged and pathological sleep need
neither food nor drink, although if any liquid
nourishment is poured into the mouth they easily
swallow it. This decreased metabolism is also .shown
by observations at Berlin on a woman who slept
without waking for forty days ; during this abnormal
sleep there was a considerable decrease in the daily
amount of urea secreted (falling to a third of the
normal amount), the blood was notably thickened,
and the quantity of haemoglobin was relatively
greater than normal.

Sensibility in all its forms is usually weakened
during such a sleep. The subjects almost never
dream, and on awaking cannot recall any sensations
experienced during sleep ; consciousness was inter-
rupted at the moment they fell asleep, and they
cannot understand that they have slept for weeks or
months. The face during this strange sleep is usually
pale, and an ophthalmoscopic observation made in
London in 1891 of the eyes of a man who had slept
uninterruptedly for seventeen days showed that all
the vessels of the retinae, both veins and arteries, were
excessively contracted (Brudenell Carter).

Most of these pathological sleepers exhibit a more
or less pronounced cataleptic condition which imparts
a certain rigidity to their muscles, so that in this
respect the prolonged sleep of human subjects pre-
sents a complete resemblance to the winter-sleep of
animals.

With these attacks of prolonged pathological sleep
we may also group the briefer attacks frequently con-
sidered to be of an epileptic character, which Fdr^ calls
paroxysmal sleep, and which consist in more or less

PAROXYSMAL SLEEP,

fleeting interruptions of consciousness, manifested by
the subject in the midst of the most diverse occupa-
tions, even while talking, and then the phrase may be
interrupted, perhaps in the middle of a word, which
is completed when the attack is over, without any
knowledge of what has happened. It is of special
interest to observe that such interruption of conscious
activity in the victims of epileptic petit mal is only
observed when the patient is occupied in some work
which demands the active participation of conscious-
ness ; if, on the contrary, the attack comes on when
the patient is engaged in some habitual work of
routine which can be accomplished without the aid of
consciousness, the attack fails to interrupt the work.
Thus it has been observed that violinists continue to
play in the orchestra, without making mistakes or
getting out of time, although consciousness is inter-
rupted by an attack of epileptic petit mal (Ribot).
But such patients are never able to carry on a con-
versation or continue a narrative when consciousness
is temporarily annihilated by petit mal. Such a fact
shows clearly that there is an intimate and indissol-
uble connection between consciousness and human
speech, and as human speech cannot be exercised
without consciousness, the epileptic attack always
interrupts speech.

Paroxysmal sleep usually occurs in disturbed states
of the nutrition of the organism generally, such as
in various circulatory and digestive disturbances, in
diseases of the heart and liver, in hysteria and
neurasthenia as well as in epilepsy. The patient is
seized suddenly as if by an epileptic attack and
remains in a deep stupor from which no stimulus
will rouse him. This may happen while he is

100

SLEEP,

at work, at table, when walking, etc. Lasegue
reports a case in which a young waiter suddenly
fell asleep while serving and stood sleeping for a
minute with the glass in his hand, after which he
awoke and continued serving. The sleep often
develops before the patient has time to sit down,
but in other cases he feels the ordinary premonitory
symptoms of sleep. The sleep lasts usually for a
few minutes, sometimes half-an-hour or more. The
attacks vary in frequency, but they tend to become
more frequent, once a month, once a week, once a
day, and in a case reported by G^lineau there were as
many as two hundred attacks a day. The attacks
may be brought on in a variety of ways, by walking
or other muscular exertion, by emotion, by sexual
excitement. Some patients are especially sensitive
during a thunder-storm. The sleep exhibits all the
characteristics of normal sleep in an intense degree.
The extremities are relaxed, the sensibility so dimin-
ished that neither shouting nor mechanical stimulation
will arouse the subject. The respiration and pulse
are both slackened, and the pupils are usually dilated,
not even contracting to strong sunlight There are
no dreams. As a rule these subjects sleep well at
night They often belong to nervous families, and
the attacks sometimes alternate with slight epileptic
attacks, whence this sleep has been called the epilep-
toid sleep, and by Mendel is considered a form of
masked epilepsy. I have had occasion to observe
two such cases; both patients were illiterate and of
slow intellect One of them, a housemaid of nine-
teen years of age, was a very sound sleeper at night,
and in the daytime one could never be sure of her
remaining awake. I have seen her going to sleep in

CATALEPSY.

lOI

the very act of announcing a visitor and in bringing
in a tray with cups full of coffee. The other was a
woman of fifty, who was a nurse till in one of her
sleeping paroxysms she dropped the infant on
the floor and nearly killed him. In both the pulse
was remarkably slow: in the girl it varied between
50 and 70 beats when awake; in the woman of fifty
between 40 and 60. Every excitement caused, in-
stead of acceleration, a retardation of the heart-beats,
the pulse falling to 35 in the woman and to 40 in
the girl.

To the same group belongs catalepsy, of which
an outbreak raged endemically for several years at
Billinghausen, near Wurzburg, and was described by
Vogt. Half the inhabitants suffered from attacks
of catalepsy, only lasting for a few minutes, during
which the face became intensely pale, the limbs
motionless, consciousness, if not altogether abolished,
much obscured, and speech embarrassed. The attacks
were liable to occur at any moment and fixed the
patient in the position in which they caught him.
All those who were attacked showed a very feeble
physical and intellectual development. The disease
was transmitted by heredity, not immediately by
parents to children, but atavistically, by skipping
a generation, from grandparents to grandchildren.
Those attacked by this cataleptic disorder were
commonly called die Starren (rigid).

It may not be unnecessary to remark here that
serious derangement and enfeeblement of conscious-
ness always affects the muscular system ; thus idiots
are characterised by more or less awkwardness of
movement (Ireland), and Maudsley remarks that a
skilful physician can diagnose idiocy by the patient s

102

SLEEP.

movements alone, adding that he can himself diagnose
other mental affections by the movements. Various
authors (Bruno Meyer) have also remarked that gross
and vulgar psychic qualities are always reflected in
the movements, and that thus a face with regular
and beautiful features may become disagreeable and
repulsive when it expresses a brutal disposition, while
ugly and irregular features may charm us if the play
of their expression reveals a beautiful soul. So that
if attacks of epileptic petit mat do not disturb even
the delicate movements executed by the violinist, it
can only be because they last too short a time to
interfere seriously with consciousness.

It is to be specially noted with reference to nar-
colepsy or pathological sleep, that those persons who
become victims of this disorder always belong either
to the lower and least developed classes of the com-
munity, or else to families which show hereditary
traces of nervous or mental disease. This is natural,
for in order for narcolepsy to declare itself a very
weak and unstable condition of consciousness is
required.

Very often the victims of this disorder present a
series of narcoleptic attacks, repeated more or less
often, and with a marked tendency to aggravation
at every repetition. Before the attacks the patients
sometimes say themselves that they feel weak and
stupid, as in the case described by Ward Cousins.
Sometimes narcolepsy develops after a violent emo-
tion (as in the cases described by Barker and Imbert).
Thus cases may be found in medical literature of
narcolepsy developed as a result of the grief occasioned
by the loss of a beloved person, or after a loss of for-
tune. There is special interest in the case of Napoleon

CAUSES OF NARCOLEPSY.

103

after the battle of Aspern, the first battle which the
Emperor lost after seventeen victories. He was so
overcome by this reverse that he experienced in-
vincible somnolence, and slept for thirty-six hours
without awakening, so that his suite feared for his life.
It is known that he usually slept very little, for only
four or five hours, so that it can be easily understood
that the loss of this battle must for the time have
greatly overcome his powerful consciousness.

In other cases narcolepsy appears after great
physical fatigue, as, for example, after prolonged
dancing (Haller). Sergius Botkine, the distinguished
physician, has told me of three cases of narcolepsy
which he observed at St. Petersburg. Two of these
patients were young girls, one of whom went to sleep
after a ball and could not be awakened ; the other
was successfully treated by electricity, but recovery was
only temporary, the attacks of narcolepsy appearing
again after a time, and recurring at frequent intervals.
The third patient was an old woman, whose case
resembled that of the mathematician Moivre, al-
ready mentioned. In the sixteenth century a case
of narcolepsy was recorded, developing as the result
of a long vigil, and terminated by death. In another
case, a young girl having lost her way in a forest, and
becoming greatly fatigued in finding it again, on
reaching home fell into a strange sleep from which
she could not be awakened.

In those cases of narcolepsy in which sleep is so
deep as to constitute a danger to life, respiration and
cardiac pulsation diminish to such an extent that on
superficial examination they cannot be detected, as
happened in a case described by Schaber. The patient
was a soldier who suffered from narcolepsy fjom the

104

SLEEP.

age of twelve; at the age of twenty-two he had an
attack which lasted seven days and from which he
nearly died, but was saved by the application of heat,
massage, and artificial respiration. A century ago
such attacks terminated in death more often than
to-day; for at that time it was usual to bleed such
patients as a matter of routine; their condition was
thus aggravated and death more or less accelerated.

To give a clear notion of this singular disease I
will describe a typical case. The patient was forty-
three years of age when he began to show signs of
mental disorder, with ideas of persecution. From
this he recovered in time, but all intellectual work
had become impossible; even reading fatigued him
immediately, and he slept badly. He now began to
complain of heaviness in the head; he only replied to
questions by monosyllables ; and before long he fell
into a sleep which lasted two hundred and twenty-
one days. He was treated by electricity, and beneath
its influence his pulse quickened, but notwithstanding
the treatment the attacks became more and more
frequent, though many of them only lasted for four
days. Besides electricity, douches were tried, but
they were without effect. In the intervals of attacks
the patient would quietly take a book and continue
reading from the point where he had been interrupted
by the attack, even although the interruption had
lasted for a month or six weeks. Before his last
attack of narcolepsy, which lasted longer than any of
the others and terminated in death, the patient had
undergone an exceptional degree of mental work,
having occupied himself with physics and physiology.
This final attack lasted four hundred and sixty-five
days. At the autopsy a centre of necrosis was found

CASES OF PROLONGED SLEEP. I05

in the brain. During the last eight years he had
spent 1698 days, or more than four and a half years,
in sleep. It should be stated that the patient be-
longed to a family in which there was a hereditary
predisposition to mental disease.

A case of narcolepsy, which may be regarded as
typical, was carefully studied by Semelaigne at Paris.
The patient was a man of fifty-six, who first slept for
seven months without interruption. This attack was
succeeded by alternating periods of sleeping and
waking; the longest narcoleptic attack, the thirty-
ninth, lasting for fifteen months. No signs of mental
disorder were observed. During the attacks he was
motionless and absolutely mute; the eyelids were
closed and the eyes turned inwards: the expression
was calm and emotionless. The pulse was soft;
pulse-rate, 60. Respiration normal, and temperature
C. 36.7. He died after a continuous attack of over
three months. The autopsy revealed adhesions of
the membranes, and considerable wasting of the
convolutions, especially in the motor zone.^

^ Annales Med. Psych., January 1885. Various cases of prolonged
natural sleep will be found in the Diet. ency. des sci. mid., art.
“Sommeil,” pp. 299 et seq. At the Rochefort Hospital there was
recently a patient styled by the medical press “a true sleeper.” During
three months the sleeper, whose name is Victorine Doirat, was carefully
watched, therefore shamming was out of the question. She was
admitted into the hospital on January 31st, 1897. During a month she
had been plunged more or less in sleep, remaining in a cataleptic con-
dition for five consecutive days without eating or drinking, or satisfying
any of the wants of Nature. The day on which she was taken to the
hospital she had an attack of somnambulism, and frightened her
neighbours by going to them moving tike an automaton with shut eyes.
The morning after her admission the chef de set vice going his rounds
found her asleep. By means of stimulants and suggestions she was
awakened and induced to take some soup and drink some milk. An
hour afterwards she fell into cataleptic sleep. This condition con-

io6

SLEEP.

In the first case described electricity seemed tlie
surest method of awakening the patient, as also it
has been found in cases described by Elze, Botkinc,
and Ilufeland. And as we have already seen that
in insomnia, that is to say in a condition exactly
opposed to narcolepsy, electricity has also yielded
good results, it is evident that in both cases it acts,
so to say, as a passive gymnastics of the blood-
vessels, improving the tone of the vessel walls, and
thus probably at once averting both semi-paralytic
dilatation and spasmodic contraction of the cerebral
vessels.

This explanation of the salutary influence of
electricity in narcolepsy is justified by the well-
established fact that massage of the body has often
produced good effects in narcolepsy. I have already
referred to Schaber’s case, in which a young man of
twenty-two was aroused from narcolepsy and saved
from death by energetic massage of the whole body.
A case also has been reported in England of a man
who during fifteen years manifested a marked tend-
ency to sleep, and during the last two years suffered
from genuine attacks of narcolepsy. These attacks
came on suddenly, even in the midst of interesting

tinned, interrupted by intervals of waking, which were very variable.
Sometimes they occurred several times in a day ; at others after two or
three days’ sleep. The waking intervals never exceeded two minutes.
She opened her eyes and asked for food ; if not immediately satisfied
she fell asleep. In order to oblige her to take nourishment, she was
awakened by stimulating the median and ulnar nerves, but her eyes
closed again almost as soon as they opened. At twenty years of age her
excited condition obliged her family to put her in an asylum. At twenty-
eight she married a deaf and dumb man. Her appearance w-as healthy.
The eyelids constantly trembled, the body was rigid, and the limbs re-
mained for several hours in the position in which they were placed.
{Lancet, 8th May 1897.)

NARCOLEPSY AND HIBERNATION. 10/

occupations, as when he was playing at caids. Once
the attack came on after he had rung at the door of
a house and while he was still waiting for it to be
opened. No treatment proved effectual until Morrison
employed massage, when the narcolepsy disappeared

completely.^

In the presence of these facts we may trace an
analogy between narcolepsy in the human subject
and hibernation in animals, for, according to Valentin s
observations, the surest method of arousing animals
from their winter-sleep is electricity. We have seen,
also, that metabolism is decreased both in hibernation
and narcolepsy, that respiration and heart-action are
slackened, the temperature markedly lowered, and
that in both cases the muscles may exhibit more
or less accentuated cataleptic phenomena. In nar-
colepsy there is a great diminution in the need for
food and drink, if not its complete abolition, so that
in this respect, also, pathological human sleep le-
sembles the winter-sleep of animals. Finally, it may
be noted that hibernation only occurs in animals which
by the organisation of their nervous system are lowly
placed in1;he zoological scale, and that among human
subjects narcolepsy is met in individuals belonging to
families with a hereditary predisposition to nervous
and mental disease, or who are hysterical, or un-
intelligent—that is to say, in persons whose con-
sciousness is altered by disease, or undeveloped, and
consequently feeble.

It has been observed that attacks of various
spasmodic and convulsive disorders often appear
during sleep ; thus convulsions usually occur in

1 Alex. IMorrison, “ Somnolence cured by Massage,” Fracdlioner,
April 1889.

ro8

SLEEP.

children at night during sleep. It is so, also,
with epilepsy, which sometimes occurs only during
sleep, and the paroxysms of asthma; spasm of the
glottis (as in laryngismus stridulus and catarrhal
croup) is most easily started during sleep. On
the other hand, it is recognised that both little
children and cretins show a marked tendency to
convulsive disorders (Maudsley), and, as Weiss justly
remarks, this tendency can only be explained by the
undeveloped state of the nervous system, and as all
exercise of will and inhibition of reflex movement
are impossible in the absence of consciousness, we
may conclude that this tendency is connected with
a feeble development of consciousness. Anstie
showed that the action of hypnotic and narcotic
drugs increased reflex activity, and, as has already
been pointed out, narcotics to some extent resemble
normal sleep in their action. We may conclude,
therefore, that convulsive disorders develop more
easily the weaker consciousness is, and that a
strong and developed consciousness is refractory to
such disorders.

This is supported by Mackenzie’s observations
on chorea, or St. Vitus’s dance, which have shown
that this convulsive disorder occurs much more
frequently in the lower social classes, among whom
cerebral activity is not generally developed to a high
degree. According to these observations, in loo
cases of chorea, only 2.79 occur among the upper
classes, and 26.74 among the middle classes, while
not less than are found among the lower classes.
It is believed that these numbers really represent
the frequency with which chorea occurs in different
classes of society. It must of course be remembered

AUTOMATISM.

109

that the lower and middle classes largely predominate
in number over the upper classes. Still the figures
seem significant.^

Since all enfeeblement and interruption of conscious
cerebral activity reinforces the reflex phenomena in
the organism, we may, for instance, understand
why purely reflex movement like a cough becomes
specially troublesome at night, and torments us
precisely when we- are about to fall asleep. It must
be added, however, that convulsive disorders are not
always due to purely reflex movements, some being
caused by loss of the equilibrium between antagonistic
muscles, such equilibrium being necessary to assure
the regular and normal activity of the muscular
system. Thus various spasmodic affections, like
paralysis agitans, chorea, and other spasmodic move-
ments of special muscles, disappear during deep sleep.
In the same way, when such reflex convulsions
(epilepsy, eclampsia, etc.) occur in the waking state,
they are always accompanied by loss of consciousness,
and there is an approach to the automatic state.

Automatism in psychology is that state in which
an individual accomplishes mechanically different
muscular acts without the participation of conscious-
ness.^ In a very pronounced and complete form it is
sometimes observed after injury to the head, but it
may also be called forth by different pathological
affections of the central nervous system. Thus the
subject may not understand or be able to answer any

^ Stephen Mackenzie, “ Report on Chorea,” British Medical
Journal, 26th February 1887.

^ The precise definition and classification of automatic acts are, how-
ever, still somewhat obscure. See C. Richet, art. “ Automatisme,”
Diet, de Physiologic, 1896.

I lO

SLEEP.

question ; the organ of hearing remains intact, and
the subject hears all that is said, but in reply he
can only repeat mechanically what he has heard,
over and over again, at each repetition cutting the
phrase shorter and omitting final syllables until the
whole has disappeared. This phenomenon is called
echolalie.

In the category of automatic acts we may include
the different habitual movements reproduced by per-
sons during severe illness ; thus a glass-blower, when
unconscious from illness, began to blow vigorously as
soon as the spoon or cup containing medicine touched
his lips, and Hughlings Jackson mentions a militia
sergeant who curled and twisted his moustache with
“remarkable regularity and grace” during the coma
of cerebral haemorrhage. In the last moments of life
our habitual movements may thus reveal what we
were.

In place of quoting further examples I will describe
a single case reported by Mesnet.^ At the battle of
Bazeilles, in 1870, a soldier was wounded in the region
of the left parietal bone, and was compelled to pass
two years in hospital on account of right-sided
paralysis, which at length disappeared almost com-
pletely, and the patient, while still under observation
himself, was able to act as an attendant in the
hospital. He was subject to attacks of complete
interruption of consciousness, during which he could
see nothing, not even the brightest light, and hear
nothing ; taste and smell were also absent, touch
alone remaining ; thus as he walked he would knock

^ E. Mesnet, “De I’automatisme de la Memoire et du Souvenir dans
le Somnambulisme pathologique,” July 1S74; also

summarised in Journ, Alental Science^ Oct. 1875.

CASES OF AUTOMATISM. HI

against the objects in his path, but by touch was able
to find his way. He felt no pain, and could be
pinched or pricked without knowing it. During these
attacks the patient was transformed into a complete
automaton. He repeated mechanically all the move-
ments and actions of his normal life, walked, rolled
cigarettes, lighted them, smoked them, but without
observing whether it was wool or sawdust that he
smoked in place -of tobacco. He ate and drank, but
he would swallow the most nauseous medicine with-
out realising that it was not wine. If a stick was
presented to him in a manner that recalled a gun to
him, he manipulated it accordingly, at the same time
recalling scenes he had lived through during the
war and pronouncing the appropriate words. These
attacks appeared at intervals of from fifteen to twenty
days, without fixed periodicity, and lasted for a day
or two. During the intermediate days his state was
entirely normal, and he was unable to recall what had
happened during his attacks of automatism. We
shall have to study such cases when dealing with
dual personality.

Some light is thrown on consciousness by those
cases in which it is abolished temporarily, whether by
a ball in the brain or by depression of the skull. At
the battle of the Nile a British captain while giving
an order from the quarter-deck received a shot on the
skull, which drove inwards a portion of the bone and
immediately deprived him of consciousnes^i He was
taken home, and for no less than fifteen months he
lay in Greenwich Hospital deprived of sense and
speech. An operation was then performed on the
head which immediately restored him to conscious-
ness ; whereupon he rose in his bed and completed

I 12

SLEEP,

the interrupted command.^ Many similar cases are
to be found in clinical records, and they serve to show
that with the interruption of consciousness associated
movements are also interrupted and may long remain
in, as it were, a latent state.

Consciousness and Attention. — We have seen that in
an arrest of consciousness, such as narcolepsy, however
long it lasts, the subject on awakening resumes his
conscious life at the point where it was arrested by
the pathological sleep. We have also seen that con-
sciousness alone among our psycho-neural aptitudes
needs complete repose, and that when divided, as in
mental disease, it ceases to be fatigued, and sleep
becomes less necessary. The continuous activity of
consciousness, in other words, with its accompanying
activity of the circulation, of metabolism, etc., involves
the simultaneous exhaustion of its anatomical ele-
ments and a necessary need of repose, of sleep. We
can thus understand why absolute insomnia is even
more injurious than complete absence of food, and
also why a superficial and often interrupted sleep
exerts a pernicious action on the organism.

The continuous watchfulness of consciousness is
shown by those cases in which a man, absorbed in
thought or in his work, neither hears the clock

^ Forbes Winslow, Obscure Diseases of ihe Bram and Mind, p. 374.
Winslow quotes from Oliver the case, which occurred in the seventeenth
century, of a farm labourer at Timsbury, near Bath, who slept con-
tinuously for seventeen weeks, and then awoke “ perfectly unconscious
that he had slept more than one night. Nothing could make him
believe that he had been asleep for so lengthened a period, until, upon
going into the fields, he saw crops of barley and oats ready for the sickle,
which he remembered were only sown when he last visited them,”
Such occurrences no doubt lay at the foundation of the legends con-
cerning persons who slept for a century or more, without realising the
lapse of time.

INHIBITED CONSCIOUSNESS. H3

striking the hours nor the remarks which are made
to him; but afterwards, tearing himself away from
his absorbing occupation, he hears retrospectively, so
to speak, the sounds which have disappeared in space
but are preserved in his consciousness. Henle has
shown that such reproduction of long vanished
sounds, not perceived immediately, may even make
itself felt on the following day, twenty-four hours
afterwards.

At the first glance it seems that such cases show
chiefly the possibility of perception without conscious-
ness, but this is not accurate. It is sufficient to
analyse such facts carefully — and we may all do so
upon ourselves — to be convinced that it is not correct
to say that we do not hear the sound of the clock,
or the melody played, or the words addressed to us,
for we hear them all; only we do not stop to analyse
these sounds, we put them aside, as it were, until we
have completed the work in hand. In proof of this
it may be recalled that whenever in the course of
absorbing work it is necessary to hear the stroke of
the clock, or other sounds, we do hear them in spite
of our absorption, and at once interrupt our work.
This often happens to those who are attending
to the sick. To keep off sleep in the silence of
the sick chamber we perhaps take up an interest-
ing book ; but we do not become so absorbed in
it that we cannot at the same time be attentive
to the movements of the patient, to his respira-
tion, his moans, and however attractive the book
may be we remember the hour when the medicine
must be administered.

Such facts show that consciousness is capable of
perceiving different sensations simultaneously, but

SLEEP.

1 14

is able to leave the detailed analysis of these sensa-
tions to a favourable moment. Those impressions
which, for one reason or another, have not reached
consciousness are lost absolutely and for ever. We
must, therefore, suppose that consciousness can con-
centrate its energy on one part of its domain, while
not completely abandoning the other parts, though
here its activity is inhibited and limited to the most
elementary acts of perception, to the exclusion of
all the higher psychic functions of association,
judgment, etc.

It is easy to understand that such artificial in-
hibition is only possible at the price of considerable
tension, of an energetic discipline of consciousness,
so that persons whose consciousness is feebly
developed are powerless to concentrate their atten-
tion on anything for any length of time. It is, for
instance, found that children the younger they are
experience the greater difficulty in fixing their
attention. The same is true of savages; thus Mac-
Cauley narrates that a Seminole Indian of Florida
replied to his first questions concerning the language
and life of his people every morning and afternoon
for a fortnight through the severe heat of an attic
room. “ I could see how much I wearied him,’’ re-
marks MacCauley ; “ often I found by his answers
that his brain was, to a degree, paralysed by the long-
continued tension to which it was subjected. But the
only sign of weakness he made was on one day about
noon, when, after many, to me, vexatious failures to
draw from him certain translations into his own
language of phrases containing verbs illustrating
variations of mood, time, number, etc., he said to
me, ‘ Doctor, how long you want me to tell you

THE INFLUENCE OF MONOTONY. II5

Indian language?’ ‘Why,’ I replied, ‘are you tired,
Billy ? ’ ‘ No,’ he answered, ‘ a littly. Me think

me tell you all. Me don’t know English language.
Bum-by you come, next winter, me tell you all. Me
go to school. Me learn. Me go hunt deer to-
mollow.’ ” ^

The expenditure of cerebral energy involved in the
concentration of attention is also illustrated by the
fact that idiots are often powerless to fix their atten-
tion; and that many persons in consequence of ill-
ness fall victims of a pathological enfeeblement of the
central nervous system.

Differences in the power of concentrating atten-
tion are also observed among animals. I may refer
to the case, described by Darwin, of a man who
taught tricks to monkeys, 'and wishing to purchase a
few monkeys for this purpose, offered to pay double
the price asked if he might be allowed to keep several
of them for some days before making his choice.
On being asked the reason for this choice, he ex-
plained that he could thus decide which would suit
him best, by observing how they followed the
different tricks performed before them. Those most
able to fix attention upon the tricks were always best
able to learn, while those only capable of fleeting
attention would prove more or less refractory to all
teaching.

The Influence of Monotony. — All monotony of
thought or feeling is a source of fatigue, and if

1 MacCauley, “ Seminole Indians of Florida,” Fifth Anjiual Report
Bu7'eau of Ethnology, 1883-84, p. 493. It may be added that perhaps
even a European, not accustomed to mental exertion, after answering
grammatical questions in an unfamiliar language seven hours daily for a
fortnight might experience some fatigue of consciousness.

SLEEP.

1 16

lasting for a considerable time may have grave re-
sults, since, as we have seen, concentration of con-
sciousness on a single series of phenomena may cause
limitation of activity in other fields.

Psychological experiments in the laboratory have
shown how speedily monotonous work produces
fatigue.^ Clinical evidence had already reached the
same result. Crichton Browne expresses the belief
that acute dementia is specially developed under the
influence of emotional and intellectual monotony.
He calls attention to the fact that the English
regiments stationed on the west coast of Africa,
forced to lead an extremely monotonous life,
furnish a much larger quota of mental diseases
than the regiments situated in other localities where
life is more varied. He attributes, also, the frequent
development of insanity in young criminals to the
monotonous life of prisons and reformatories.

It is well known that when we concentrate our
attention on a monotonous sound or on some uniform
sensation, sleep speedily results ; thus Boerhaave
made his patients drowsy by making them listen to
the sound of drops of water falling upon a metallic
surface. Russian nobles, in the good old days, had
another method for sending themselves to sleep; they
ordered their servants to scratch their heels for a
long time. The mothers of Corea, A. H. Savage-
Landor tells us, send their infants to sleep by scraping
them gently on the abdomen, a method which is
always successful even with the most restless baby.
There are people who count in order to send them-

^ See, for instance, Kraepelin’s Psychologische Arbeiten (“ Ueber
Ermiidung und Erholung,” von W. II. R. Rivers and E. Kraepelin),
Bd. L, Heft 4, 1896.

HYPNOSIS.

II7

selves to sleep ; ladies have their hair brushed ;
monotonous lullabies are sung to children ; but all
these methods may be reduced to the effort to
fatigue consciousness by monotony, and thus to
induce sleep.

The manipulations of the hypnotist in the same
way tend to fatigue consciousness by the monotony
of visual, auditory, or tactile sensations, and so to
provoke its temporary arrest. No doubt the hyp-
notiser succeeds best in. those subjects who are not
possessed of a powerful consciousness, but aie some-
what lowly placed in the intellectual scale.^ It is not
surprising that if such subjects are often submitted to
hypnosis they may become habituated to hypnotic
arrests of consciousness, so that at length they may
fall into the hypnotic state at the mere sight of
a bright object, or even when their own hands
are placed in a certain position, as Ball found
in the case of a lady’s maid upon whom her too
inquisitive mistress had made hypnotic experiments.
Under the influence of repeated hypnosis the con-
sciousness may become more and more enfeebled, a
risk to which those who use hypnotism have now
become fully alive 5 it has also been found that
convulsions occur in those subjects who are liable
to them ; Mesmer went so far as to assert that no
benefit was obtainable unless hysterical convulsions
were produced. It has even been asserted that
insanity may result from hypnosis. The number
of persons sensitive to hypnosis at any given epoch

^ At the same time, as Forel and others have pointed out, the brain
must be sound to fall under the influence of hypnosis; it is difficult,
and often impossible, to produce hypnosis in the insane or even the
hysterical.

ii8

SLEEP.

might thus be said to be in inverse ratio to the
general mental development. Perhaps there has
been an improvement in this respect during the
last eighty years, for in 1815 Matthei wrote that
only one in fifty persons was refractory to mes-
merism, while Hansen recently stated at St. Peters-
burg that only three in ten fall under its influence;
as, however, the figures obtained by various experi-
menters widely vary, it is not possible to trust these
figures implicitly. If the fact is so we ought to
rejoice, for the best state of society is that which
counts among its members the largest number of
individuals possessing a strongly developed con-
sciousness, and the fewest of those who approach
the type of animals in whom the spinal nervous
system predominates. The contagious psychic dis-
orders and crimes of crowds, of late studied by
Sighele, Le Bon, and Tarde, become less and less
possible as consciousness predominates in a com-
munity, for what above all favours the propagation
of such psychic epidemics is the presence of a con-
siderable number of people with feebly developed
consciousness, people of the spinal type; it is such
that furnish the condition of development of epi-
demics of suicides and of all illogical theories and
superstitions.

As an example of a psychic epidemic well illus-
trating this tendency of the nervous system, I may
refer to a psychopathic religious epidemic which
occurred a few years ago at Kiev, and was studied
by Ssikorski.^ The originator of the movement was
insane, and a large number of his followers, chiefly
peasants, exhibited nervous symptoms. They were

^ Universitehkija Isxvjesfija, 1893.

A RELIGIOUS ERIDEMIG.

fn a state of exaltation^ confident that they would not
die, and need not work, as God would take care of
them. Eighty per cent, of them had sensory illu-
sions, most of them hallucinations of smell, causing
them to perceive extremely agreeable odours which
they attributed to the propinquity of Heaven, or to
the presence of the Holy Ghost. They spoke with
tongues, sometimes had complete analgesia with
feelings of lightness, as if floating in the air. Some
heard the voice of God, or the whispering of the
Holy Ghost, and saw heaven open before them.
The prevalence of muscular and spinal symptoms
was shown by a marked tendency to fall to the
earth, to jump and strike themselves on the breast,
and by the frequency of convulsions obviously of
an hysterical character, while the women would
undress themselves and become erotically excited.

With enfeebled consciousness and heightened ac-
tivity of the reflex system, all the movements are
less differentiated and less easy to master. They are
apt to extend to other muscular groups; every act
becomes complicated by other analogous acts, and
there is thus always a tendency to imitation and to
the appearance of irresistible impulses. Thus it is
found that not only monkeys, but the lower human
races, as well as children, the undeveloped and the
hysterical, are characterised by a strong impulse to
imitate what they see ; they are “suggestible.” Thus
Hugstrem narrates that among the Lapps he often
found individuals who imitated every movement as
well as the expression of the travellers who talked to
them ; all these subjects showed a highly-developed
reflex system, and every unexpected sensation, such
as a sudden sound, caused general convulsions.

150

SLEEP.

Among various races in different parts of the world
similar nervous disorders have been found very
prevalent. Latah, found among the Javanese and
among the Malays generally, has been especially
studied.^ It occupies a place midway between hysteria
and epilepsy, and Gilmore Ellis considers that it is
very closely related to hypnotism. Attacks are
easily excited ; even a look or a movement of the
head by another person, or the mention of a word
like “tiger” or “alligator,” is sufficient to start it.
The affection is distinctly hereditary, and those
affected are mostly women. The subject will repeat
everything that is said, and imitate everything that is
done before him, so that he may even be made to
cause the death of his own child, as in one oft-quoted
case in which a sailor tossed up a piece of wood
before the ship’s cook, who was liable to be attacked
by latah and was at the time nursing his baby; the
cook imitated the sailor by throwing up the baby, and
when at last the wood fell to the ground the baby
fell also and was immediately killed. The subject is
conscious but powerless. O’Brien, who has described
this disorder, gives the following case as typical : —
“A Malay woman of respectable position and ex-
ceedingly respectable age was introduced to me some
time ago as a strong latah subject. I talked to her
for at least ten minutes without perceiving anything
abnormal in her conduct or conversation. Suddenly
her introducer threw off his coat. To my horror my
venerable guest sprang to her feet and tore off her
gown. My entreaties were too late to prevent her

^ As by Van Brero, Allgemeine Zeitschrift fur Psychiairie, Bd. ii ,
Heft 5) 3.nd W. Gilmore Ellis, Journal of Mental Science, January
1897.

LATAH.

I2I

continuing the same course with the rest of her gar-
ments, and in thirty seconds from hei seizure the
paroxysm seemed to be over. She kept on calling
the instigator of this outrage an abandoned pig,
and imploring me to kill him, all the time she
was reducing herself to a state of nudity. In the
younger women (who are generally not remarkable
for chastity), there is during an attack of latah
an entire absence of sexual restraint. The Malays
consider the affliction to be due to dreams. Van
Brero remarks that latah is really simply an ex-
agseration of the normal character of the Javanese,
who possess a mental feebleness which prevents them
from becoming independent in thought and action,
so that there is always a weak development of
individuality.

To illustrate the influence of suggestibility, in the
depressed state of consciousness produced by disease,
I may refer to a very interesting illustration which
occurred at Edinburgh some forty years ago. An
infectious febrile disease raged at this time accom-
panied by delirium ; the cases were numerous in
the practice of many doctors, but the patients of a
certain Dr. A. tended to present a special and
peculiar symptom ; they exhibited an irresistible
impulse to throw themselves out of the window.
The fact would probably have remained inexplicable
if a certain Professor D., who also manifested this
longing to throw himself from the window, had not
been one of Dr. A.’s patients. When convalescent he
narrated that he had had no tendency to this morbid
inclination until he heard Dr. A. in the bed-
room telling his friends how he had had a patient who
threw himself out of the window in delirium and was

122

SLEEP.

crushed to death on the pavement, and begging them
to watch Professor D. carefully lest he should exhibit
this impulse. The patient, who was considered in-
sensible, had followed the narration and was much
impressed by it. His consciousness, enfeebled by
disease, dwelt on the image of the patient throwing
himself on to the pavement, and from that moment
an ardent desire haunted him to do likewise. Dr. A.
had evidently been so impressed by the violent death of
the original patient, that wherever he went he urged
the utmost care lest other patients should do the same,
mostly in presence of the patients, who at once felt a
mad desire to throw themselves out of the window.
Consequently Dr. A. became more than ever im-
pressed by the danger and talked about it more
persistently, without realising that he himself was
propagating this psychic epidemic. The only pos-
sible explanation of this phenomenon is that the
febrile disease, by enfeebling the conscious cerebral
life of the patients, brought the reflexes and the spinal
nervous system into temporary predominance, so
that the patients became as imitative as little
children or savages. The weaker and more stupid
an individual becomes the more suggestible he is
rendered, and the more easily brought under every
influence.

Hypnosis and Sleep. — A further illustration may be
found in hypnosis. The subject of repeated hypno-
tisation is inevitably weakened in consciousness, the
more so as his consciousness is probably not vigorous
to start with, as we have already seen. He may
thus be reduced to the same imitative stage as
savages, in the same way as the victims of repeated
attacks of epilepsy, which is also a temporary arrest

hypnosis and sleep.

123

of consciousness, become more and more stupefied
and enfeebled, being finally reduced to a state
of complete dementia, and the subjects of irresist-
ible impulses which they obey as Dr. A. s patients
attempted to do.

Hypnosis may probably be ranged among the
pathological forms of sleep ; or, in other words, it
may be considered a pathological state of conscious-
ness, for it is an artificial enfeeblement of consciousness
produced by monotonous and uniform sensations.
During hypnotic sleep, as during hibernation and
narcolepsy, we observe a pronounced tendency to
cataleptic phenomena in the muscular system, a rein-
forcement of the reflexes (Haidenhain), and a notable
diminution in metabolism. In this respect these states
are distinguished from normal sleep, in which there
is probably increased metabolism (Durham, Fenzoldt,
and Fleisher), especially in the cerebral and nervous
tissues. For this reason hypnosis cannot replace
normal sleep, since the former enfeebles conscious
psychic activity and is not favourable to the recon-
stitution and nutrition of the tissues, and hypnotisa-
tion can only be permitted in insomnia in the same
sense and in the same degree as any other narcotic,
in the hope that it may induce a normal and salutary

1 The precise relationship of sleep to hypnosis has excited consider,
able discussion ; the very obvious resemblance of hypnosis to sleep is
embodied in the name itself chosen by Braid, and both Bernheim and
Forel, two of the chief authorities on the subject, consider hypnosis an
ordinary sleep, the person who falls asleep spontaneously being in
rapport with himself, while the hypnotised person is in rapport with
the hypnotiser. But, as Moll points out, there are various distinctions
between sleep and hypnosis, though none of them are of a very funda-
mental character; for a discussion of the question see his Hypnotis7)i
(fourth English edition), ppy^2o8-222.

124

SLEEP.

sleep. Carried out as a mere form of amusement,
hypnotism should be regarded as a crime against the
individual and the state itself, since by enfeebling
consciousness it tends, to increase the pathological
elements in the community.

Somnambulism. — Hypnotism leads us to the con-
sideration of sleep-walking or somnambulism, which
is indeed so nearly related to it that Richet and
others have used the same name for both, regarding
hypnotism as an artificial somnambulism, and sleep-
walking a natural or spontaneous somnambulism. In
the first chapter of this book (pp. 26-28) I have referred
to the fact that the muscular system does not sleep,
and have given various examples of the way in which,
under the influence of fatigue, muscular action has
continued unconsciously in a state of sleep. We may
also often observe at a concert or a lecture that
persons will fall asleep while still holding their eye-
glass, fan, or other object in the hands. Such being
the case, the action of somnambulists ought not to
surprise us, for the only difference between them and
normal subjects is that while the latter continue to
perform during sleep the action they were engaged
in before sleeping, the former go peacefully to bed,
and when asleep rise and execute automatically all
sorts of muscular acts without awakening, and con-
sequently without consciousness.

There has been much discussion and difference
of opinion as to the condition of the various sense
organs during the somnambulistic state, more espe-
cially as to the sense of sight Lelut, Guy, and
others have believed that the somnambulist is able to
see even with closed e}/es. It is, however, by no
means the case that the eyes are always closed, and

SOMNAMBULISM.

125

the dilated pupils would make it easy to see objects
with very little light It seems probable that usually
objects are not seen, the sense of touch, which m
these cases is often hyperaesthetic, to some extent
taking its place. If a somnambulist writes, it fre-
quently happens that no difference occurs in the
writing, whether or not an object is interposed
between him and the paper, and if the paper is
moved he may be unable to cross a / or dot an i
correctly. This' was accurately observed even in one
of the earliest reported cases, in Diderot’s Encyclopedic
(art. “ Somnambulisme ”).

In respect to hearing subjects vary, but there is
no doubt that in many cases they do hear, more
especially when the remarks addressed to them are
in relation to the dream that occupies them. Very
often, if a somnambulist’s name is called out, he
turns and looks fixedly | he has heard, at all events,
a sound, though he sees nothing.

In the same way the senses of smell and taste may
be active, especially in relation to the subjects of the
somnambulist’s dream ; one who asked for brandy
pushed away a glass of water after having held it
to his lips, and a somnambulist may eat a meal with
apparent relish.

The sense of touch, as I have already remarked,
is specially acute in somnambulism. All observers
have noted this, and some have even declared that it
replaces sight ; this, however, can only be regarded
as a metaphor. “Touches,” as Bain remarks, “are
as.sociated with sight, connecting the tactile pro-
perties of things with their visible appearance,
whereby the one can instantly suggest the other.”
Frank mentions a case in which a somnambulist

126

SLEEP.

was able to recognise colours by the touch when her
eyes were spasmodically closed. This, if correct,
would be due to temperature differences. The
ability sometimes shown, during this state, of
• drawing or doing very fine work is connected with
this hyperaesthesia of touch. On the other hand,

the pressure used in carrying the sleep-walker to
bed may not be felt or be sufficient to produce
awakening. Sometimes there is complete anaes-
thesia to pain, but this is, of course, consistent with
delicacy of touch.

The motor system, under the guidance chiefly of
the sense of touch, is in perfect condition, and, as
is well known, may be capable of wonderful exploits.
Speaking and' singing are by no means uncommon,
and the somnambulist may, moreover, be able to
sing or play on an instrument better than in the
normal condition. Mental processes can also be
carried on well ; although the remarkable state-
ments concerning the achievements of sleep-walkers
need careful sifting, there is no doubt that, for
example, problems in Euclid can be worked out in
this state, while school children who thus learn their
lessons at night find in the morning to their surprise
that they can repeat them correctly.^

In studying the medical literature of somnambulism
it is seen that such cases are observed mostly in grow-

^ D. Hack Take, art. “Sleep,” Diet, of Psych. Medicine; Max
Simon, Le Monde des RHes, 1888, pp. 186 et seq. It is some-
times said that somnambulism is more common among girls than boys.
This does not, however, seem to be the case. Anstie {Lancet, 1873)
found that of 42 somnambulists 25 were male and 17 female. Som-
nambulism is chiefly prevalent in youth, and then boys are chiefly
affected ; after adult age is reached the conditions are reversed and
women are much more frequently affected.

HYSTERICAL SOMNOLENCE.

127

ing children, that is in subjects who are extremely in
need of muscular exercise. At the same time there
are cases on record in which the somnambulistic
tendency was successfully treated by hard muscular
work. In view of these facts it seems natural to
ask if somnambulism is not an expression of motor
dreams originating in muscles that are insufficiently
exercised during the waking hours,

Hysterical Somnolence and Double Personality. A
morbid form of sleep closely related to those we have
been considering, allied both to narcolepsy and to
somnambulism, is that frequently called hysterical
somnolence, and studied by Lowenfeld and others.^
Such patients are suffering from cerebro-asthenia, or
enfeeblement of consciousness, and remain for a long
time in a drowsy or torpid condition, unable to make
any sustained mental exertion, and falling into long
and heavy sleeps, often without any attacks of real
hysteria or somnambulism. If the tendency to
somnolence is resisted there is a feeling of heaviness
or constriction in the head, sometimes headache,
and the eyelids feel weighed down. If the patient
continues the struggle a state of excitement may
result. Usually the somnolence gains the mastery,
the will becomes paralysed, and the patient falls into
the state of hysterical somnolence. Then there is a
tendency for what has sometimes been called a second
personality to emerge. Lowenfeld describes this second
condition as the result of a subtraction from the first
ego, rather than as an addition to it; it is not a
second personality, but the first personality with
some capacities enfeebled or in abeyance, especially
the power of exerting the will, together with all
* Centralblatt fiir Nervenheilkunde, May 1895.

128

SLEEP.

memory of the circumstances of ordinary life. It
is not clear how this change takes place, beyond
the fact that it follows on that process of brain ex-
haustion which is frequently met in hysteria. Lowen-
feld thinks it may be a species of auto-intoxication.
He has observed that in patients so affected the
attacks of somnolence are preceded for several weeks
by decreased appetite, diminished urine which (as its
injection into guinea-pigs has shown) becomes un-
usually poisonous, increased constipation, and the loss
of healthy sleep.

Sollier, who has also carefully investigated the
matter, points out that this loss of healthy sleep is
always a notable tendency in hysteria, and that it is
associated with a remarkable tendency to temporary
or periodic loss of memory, what might be called an
anesthesia of memory, during long periods of life. He
finds in these two common tendencies of hysteria the
germ which may easily develop into a second per-
sonality. “ In many cases of ordinary hysteria,” he
remarks, “ the patients are really plunged in a second
state, oi, moie accurately, in a state of vigilambulism,
and. the absence of nocturnal sleep may then be due
simply to the fact that they are in a pathological
sleep. He mentions that hysterical subjects some-
times say, “ I cannot sleep, because I am asleep all
the time,” or “ I never know if I am awake or
asleep.” i

Medical literature relates many cases in which
consciousness is divided into two or sometimes more
parts, with a separate memory belonging to each part,

1 P. Sollier, “Faits nouveaux relatifs a la nature de I’hysterie.” Al.'i
deW XI. Congi'esso Medico hiternazionale, 1894, vol. iv, (Psichialria)
p. 41.

DOUBLE PERSONALITY.

T29

and with similar divisions in the will and general
character of the subject. Such a condition has been
variously called double or duplex personality, dip-
sychia (Prichard), divided consciousness, etc. In such
cases, after a sleep of varying depth and duration,
the subjects on awakening can recall nothing. They
may be obliged to learn over again all that they had
learnt at school, reading, writing, arithmetic. They
may not even remember the necessity for knowledge.
This secondary state may last for a few days, a few
weeks, even a few months; and then after a deep
sleep or loss of consciousness, the subjects suddenly
find themselves in their earlier state, with all their
tastes and inclinations, their knowledge and character,
and with no recollection of the secondary state.
After a period of varying duration another sleep or
attack of unconsciousness may again lead them into
the secondary state with its acquisitions and its
forgetfulness of the first kate. This alternation of
consciousness may last for years, the patients remain-
ing unable to co-ordinate the two forms into a single
picture, so that while they always recognise the
persons they have known in one state whenever
they are in that state, the same persons would be
regarded as strangers if seen in the other state. The
difference may even be deeper still, as in one case
reported by Dufay de Blois, in which a girl of twenty-
four, a somnambulist from childhood, who in one state
was very short-sighted, was in the other state able to
see excellently without her glasses.

To illustrate the varying nature of these alterna-
tions of consciousness I may briefly summarise two
English cases which have recently been reported. The
first is in a girl of twelve who was shown to the Clinical

130

SLEEP.

Society of London by Dr. Albert Wilson in January
1896.^ In this case there were no less than five
different existences, including the normal, and the
condition altogether is related to hysterical somno-
lence, or, more accurately, to hystero-epilepsy. In
1895 the child had had severe influenza, followed by
great headache with intolerance of light and noise,
probably meningitis, together with mania. After
six weeks the headache disappeared and muscular
symptoms of twitchings and opisthotonos developed,
with lividity and coma. She had many fits a day. In
June the old symptoms disappeared and a fresh train
of phenomena appeared. When in an apparently
normal state she would shake, turn a somersault, and
enter a new and different mental state. Her memory
for all events during health was quite gone; but she
would remember in one such fit what had happened in
a previous one. Thus was established a complete dual
existence. By education she learned the names of
most things, but always employed baby pronuncia-
tion. She would write backwards and that quickly.
When these attacks developed she lost all power of
walking or standing till about August 1895. In the
early stage she had fits of catalepsy, chiefly rigidity
of the flexors. At times she had five or six fits a
day, lasting a few minutes, and at her worst periods
they lasted for days. She recovered from them quite
suddenly, was mever surprised at her surroundings,
but very composed, and said she remembered nothing
during the attack.- The most striking feature was
once, when she had severe toothache during an attack.
Wilson gave chloroform and removed two teeth. On
regaining consciousness she recognised that the teeth

^ Brit. Med. Journal, 1st February 1896.

ALTERNATIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS. I3I

and pain were gone. Her father hypnotised her and
brought her to the normal state when she made the
discovery of the blood and the loss of the teeth, but
she never remembered the previous pain or taking
chloroform. There had been many variations, and
she had four different existences besides the normal:

(1) “Nib” for “Old Nick” when she had violent
passions, and would bite or slide down the banisters;

(2) “dreadful wicked thing,” when everything was
reversed, black being white, asleep being awake, the
head being the foot, and so on; (3) “ Allie” when she
was amiable and good; (4) her ordinary fits, as
already described. Other phenomena occasionally
occurred. Thus, she was at times completely deaf
and dumb, or there might be loss of memory, so
that she did not know those whom she ordinarily
knew during the fits. Her general health and
nutrition were good. She had not yet menstruated.
Treatment had been rest and quiet anti fresh air.
Two years later, however, her condition remained the
same, except that the abnormal periods were more
prolonged, and during them she was almost blind,
although there were no changes in the eye. She was
slightly imbecile in manner, but could draw and even
paint in the blind state.

In another case, reported by Dr. Lewis G. Bruce,
the dual brain action was very pronounced, though
here the duality was complicated by insanity.^ The
patient varied considerably in his mental condition
during the two states, the most obvious phenomena
observed being that in one condition he spoke the
English language, and in the other the Welsh
language. When in the former state he was the

^ Brain, part Ixix., 1895.

132

SLEEP.

subject of clironic mania. Me was right-handed, and
exhibited a fair amount of intelligence. He remem-
bered clearly things he had noticed in previous
English periods, but his memory was a blank to any
that occurred during the Welsh stages. He wrote by
preference with his right hand, his letters were fairly
legible, and he wrote from left to right. When in
the Welsh stage, however, he was left-handed and
the subject of dementia. If asked to do so, he
would write with the left hand, but then produced
mirror-writing, traversing the paper from right to
left. His speech was almost unintelligible, but what
could be understood was in the Welsh language. In
this stage he had no knowledge of English. In
passing from one stage to the other he was often
ambidextrous and spoke both languages. His pulse
was also different, being full with high tension in the
English stage, weak with low tension in the Welsh
stage.

Both the foregoing cases are clearly associated with
disease. In typical cases there is often no obvious
sign of disease, even of hysteria. This was so in a
case I may quote, which is of interest both as being
typical and as being probably the earliest case re-
corded. It was observed in England in i8i6, and
described by Combe and by Macnish. In this case
a young lady of naturally very good constitution
reached adult age without any mental or physical
disease. She possessed excellent capacity and good
memory, and was highly educated according to the
standard of the day. Unexpectedly she fell into a
deep sleep, which lasted several hours beyond the
ordinary term. On awaking, it was found that she
,had lost every trace of acquired knowledge. Her

DUPLEX PERSONALITY.

133

memory was a tabula Tara ; she had to re-learn
everything, to become acquainted with the persons
and objects around her and their names, and to re-
acquire the arts of reading, writing, and arithmetic.
She made considerable progress, however, in learning,
and some months later she fell into another fit of
somnolency. When she awoke she was restored to
the same condition in which she was before the first
sleep, and moreover she was wholly ignorant of
everything that had occurred during the intervening
months. She was as unconscious of her double char-
acter as two distinct persons. These periodical
transitions continued for over four years, the alter-
nations being always preceded by a long and deep
sleep. At the time this case seems to have stood
alone. From that date until 1858, when Azam of
Bordeaux aroused interes't in the subject by his
careful study of Fdlida, a similar subject, this con-
dition seems to have passed unnoticed, or else such
cases were dismissed as merely insane or hysterical
and not worth further investigation.

In some cases, which are, however, rare, the duplex
personality appears as a sudden explosion in an ap-
parently normal individual, leading him to abandon
family and home in a state of complete unconsciousness
for weeks, months, or even years. I will present as
an example a case which Dr. A. E. Osborne observed
a few years ago in Pennsylvania.^ The subject was
a man of muscular, somewhat angular outline, past
middle-age, in admirable health, and so far as is
known free from any personal or inherited neuro-
pathic taint. For many years he had resided in
a thriving town near Philadelphia, and, by strict
^ Osborne, Medico-legal Journal, June 1894.

134

SLEEP.

application to his trade as a tinsmith and plumber,
had accumulated considerable means. With these
resources he at last opened up an establishment of his
own, and, being singularly industrious and straight-
forward, he prospered .steadily in his business. As
his sons grew up they shared in the business, and at
the time of his disappearance had materially assisted
him in the execution of some large contracts, from
which he realised handsome profits. For years he had
enjoyed ordinarily good health, and was not known
to possess any eccentricities or morbid tendencies.
His domestic relations were harmonious, his social
position better than ever before, and he was not known
to have any secret, immoral, or illicit indulgences of
any kind whatever. The Sunday of his disappearance
he had remained in the house all day, as it was a dull,
gloomy November day, engaged mainly in reading
and in play with his younger children, to whom he
was greatly attached. About four o’clock in the
afternoon he got up from the lounge on which he had
been reclining, reading, changed his house-jacket for
an ordinary business-day coat, slipped on an easy pair
of shoes, and, to his wife’s questions, stated he was
going out for a short walk in the street “ for a little
fresh air.” Noting the time, she cautioned him not
to go far, as they would soon have dinner. He
promised not to keep them waiting, declared he
would be back in a few moments, and that he
was only going for a little turn in the main street,
on which his house faced. He quietly and leisurely
stepped outside the door, and although a conspicuous
figure in the town and perfectly well known to nine-
tenths of the people of the vicinity, he disappeared as
mysteriously as though he had, as they say, “vanished

CASE OF DUPLEX PERSONALITY. 135

into thin air.” None of the townspeople saw him,
although the streets were alive with the usual Sunday
afternoon strollers. He left no trace.^ Rewards and
detectives proved unavailing. When it was necessary
to wind up the affairs of the establishment, it was
found that he had taken no money, but that his.
wife and family were handsomely provided for.
In due course of time the business was ^ finally
disposed of, the property sold, and the wife and
family removed to Chicago. The family gave up all
hope of ever* finding even a clue to the long-lost
husband and father. Two years had almost passed
when in a tin-shop in a town in one of the far
Southern States, where a number of men were
engaged at their trade, suddenly one of them
dropped his work and cried, as he pressed his
hand to his head in a dazed, bewildered way, “ My
God ! where am I ? how did I come here ? This
isn't my shop. Where am I ? what does it mean ?
At first the men were disposed to laugh at the
reserved man, who had worked for several months
so quietly by their side, and of whose history they
had not been able to learn a word, but when they,
saw his changed expression, the perspiration standing
on his brow, his nervous twitchings, and noted his
piteous appeals, they realised that it was all. something,
far from jest, and, as he was known as a sober, most
cxemplarily behaved man, they could notxharge him.
with inebriety. They called him by a name that was
now strange to him, and they insisted he had told
them such was his name. At last, trembling with
suppressed emotion, he made his way to the pro-
prietor, who was quite as much startled by the man’s
talk and manner as had been the men below. After

SLEEP,

136

months of wandering and of work combined, during
which period he had aged considerably, he was now
awakening from — shall we say his somnambulistic
sleep? It was with some difficulty that he made
the proprietor understand his true condition or
believe his story of a Northern home, a family, and
a prosperous business. The proprietor only knew
him as a wandering tinner who had drifted into the
town, sought work at his trade, was employed, proved
to be a reliable, skilled, and attentive workman, and
regarding whose antecedents the proprietor had not
inquired and the workman had not volunteered any
statements. Under the fictitious name he had given
he had been known and paid, but he had no know-
ledge of the past. He remembered nothing. At
last a dim recollection came over him of that fateful
Sunday, his rising to go out, the request to come
back for dinner, his promise to do so in a few
moments, and then* all was a blank. He had no
money, although he had worked steadily for some
months in this shop, and had been paid good wages.
What he did with the money, it seems, has never
been discovered. After ascertaining the whereabouts
of his family, he made straight for Chicago, where, by
the last accounts, he was living his usual normal life.
Somewhat mystified over his realisation of the strange
freak in which he figured, although feeling well and
apparently in normal mental balance, he yet realises
that he has been the central figure in some over-
strange mental phenomena, quite mysterious enough
to make him, at times, doubt his sanity. There are
no facts explanatory of the prime cause of his dis-
appearance, to account for the failure of his neigh-
bours to detect his flight, to explain his wanderings,

THE MODERN WANDERING JEW, I37

or to solve the conditions of his return to his normal
self.

Dr. Osborne reports another case in which a young
Irish coachman, on being thrown from his vehicle and
considerably injured, wandered away in a state of
second consciousness. Dr. Drewry has also reported
a case in which a merchant, apparently in excellent
health, suddenly changed consciousness while on a
steamer, only returning to normal consciousness after
six months ; in. this case the bursting of an abscess
in the auditory canal coincided with recovery, a very
significant fact.^ Tissie of Bordeaux has narrated at
length (and summarised in his book, Les Rives) the
history of a man whom he knew for many years,
and whose whole life has been a series of romantic
adventures due to perpetually recurring phases of
second personality. His attacks start in a dream
that he is to go to a certain place ; usually some one
in the dream offers to give him work, which it is
his constant desire to find ; for he is a hard-working
man and anxious to better his position and that of
his wife, whom his escapades have reduced to misery.
Then he awakes, or seems to awake — for the dream
is really continuing — and sets off. In this state he
can walk as much as seventy kilometres or more
a day, and weeks or months elapse before he returns
to normal consciousness. He knows all the prisons
of Europe, being frequently arrested as a vagabond,

^ W. F. Drewry, “Duplex Personality,” Medico-legal Journal, June
1896. In the Medico-legal Journal for Dec. 1893, Dr. H. Hulst
(“Artificial Multiple Personality”) narrates in careful detail the
interesting case of Miss Sadie V., who had three states of conscious-
ness. Dr. Hulst finds a reflection of the facts of multiple personality
in mythology and folk-lore, in the stories of swan-maidens, of
Melusina, etc.

138

SLEEP.

and many of its hospitals. He has visited the
whole of France, besides Algiers, Germany, Holland,
Belgium, Turkey, Hungary, Switzerland, and Russia
— where he was nearly hanged as a nihilist — almost
always on foot and in a state of dream or secondary
consciousness. He is the modern wandering Jew.^

It is still impossible to explain such division of
consciousness, but the facts instinctively recall the old
theory of Wigan, ^ according to which we all really
possess two brains, each cerebral hemisphere repre-
senting a complete brain, with this difference, that
in right-handed persons it is the left hemisphere
which attains most complete development, and in left-
handed persons the right hemisphere. This theory
has been to some extent revived since Wigan’s diy
by Sir Samuel Wilks, ^ and also by Brown-Sequardd
Lately, Dr. L. C. Bruce, founding his arguments on
cases of his own of unilateral right-sided epilepsy, has
attempted to give further precision to the conception
of dual brain action, by reference to the phenomena
of epilepsy. He argues that the unilateral epileptic
storm disorganises the one hemisphere, leaving the
other hemisphere to carry on consciousness. The
conclusions drawn from these observations were that
in the normal state of these patients the left cerebral
hemispheres controlled the functions of the right, the
mental development of which must have been low
either from atavism or from congenital deficiency not

^ The problems of double personality, which do not concern us here,
except in so far as this state is a further development of the somnambu-
listic state, maybe studied in Binet’s Alterations of rersonality (English
edition, edited by Professor Baldwin, 1896).

^ A. L. Wigan, Ihe Ditality of the Mind, 1844.

* Guy’s Hospital Reports, 1872, pp. l6l et seq.

Lancet, 1876, vol. ii. p. 75.

EPILEPSY AND BRAIN ACTION. 139

having the capability to develop. He points out the
relation between the state of epileptic automatism
following attacks of petit mal and the states of con-
sciousness previously described, and also the loss of
inhibitory power, and tendency to irritability common
to all patients subject to epilepsy. In the brains of
those who through heredity were predisposed to
epilepsy and the allied neuroses, there was possibly a
considerable difference in the mental development
and education, of the two hemispheres. Such a
condition would render a man more liable to brain
fatigue. The whole character of the incipient epilep-
tic was that of a man with a brain easily exhausted.
Given a heredity to the neuroses, there is no great
step to that sudden discharge of energy which we
name epilepsy. Dr. Bruce therefore suggests that
in some cases of epilepsy the disease is due to a
want of equal education or development in the two
cerebral hemispheres, thus rendering the patient
liable to unusual brain exhaustion,^

However this may be, pathological and anatomical
observations have well established the fact that the
organs of speech, and consequently the chief organs
of thought, are in right-handed people localised in
the left cerebral hemisphere and in left-handed persons
in the right hemisphere. This difference in the
localisation of the speech centres, according to the
predominance of the right hand or the left, is
connected with the decussation of the nerves, those
from the left hemisphere going to the right side of
the body, and from the right hemisphere to the left

^ “ On Dual Brain Action, and its Relation to certain Epileptic
States.” Paper read to Edinburgh Medico-chirurgical Society, Feb.
3rd, 1897.

140

SLEEP.

side. Observations which I have carried out on
persons suffering from left-sided migraine have shown
that during this hemicranial pain the left hand tem-
porarily acquired the ability to write better than
usual, a fact which I explain by supposing that
dining left hemicrania the right cerebral hemisphere
becomes unusually active. On the other hand, I
have also found by direct observation that if during
the early hours of deep sleep we tickle the sleeper’s
face on the right side of the median line, the same
result always follows: the sleeper acts as though he
were driving away a troublesome fly, and always with
the left hand, even although he may be lying on his
left side and the action of the left hand is thus im-
peded; the right hand remains motionless, though it
may be lying freely by the body. I have repeated
this experiment on fifty-two persons of varying age
and both sexes, from children of three to men and
women of over sixty. In every case the result was
the same: during the first two or three hours of sleep
(when it is deepest, according to Kohlschiitter) it was
always the left hand which made the movements
required to brush away this unpleasant tickling. It
thus became a matter of interest to ascertain whether
left-handed people resemble the right-handed in this
respect, and, thanks to the complaisance of some of
my friends, I was able to observe eight individuals
who were almost completely left-handed — that is to
say, who wrote, ate, sewed with the left hand, though
at the same time executing various movements with
the right hand, such as making the sign of the cross
or combing the hair ; among them was a man who
had served in the army and who was right-handed
with his rifle. All those persons, when tickled with

THE TJrEORY OF DUAT. BRAIN ACTION. I4I

a feather during deep sleep, made a movement as
though to brush away a fly, and ahvays with the right
hand, even although they were lying on the right side
with the right arm beneath them, and the left lying
free. They used the right hand in the same way as
right-handed people use the left hand 5 in other
words, the hand most active during waking life
remained motionless during sleep, its functions being

undertaken by the other hand.^

These facts may be explained on the hypothesis
that the most active cerebral hemisphere is resting
during the hours of deep sleep, since there can be no
doubt that, as Broca used to say, the right-handed
arc left-brained, and the left-handed right-brained.

There are other observations which support this
view of the supplementary functions of the cerebral
hemispheres. During ^ my investigations into the
effects of complete insomnia on puppies I constantly
observed that the reflexes disappeared and reappeaied
periodically, first in the limbs of one side, and then in
those of the other, the animals, enfeebled by sleep,
becoming insensible to the different irritations of the
skin. It appeared that the animal’s insensibility was
not stationary, but in a migratory condition; after con-
tinuing from ten to twenty minutes on the right side
of the body it was transferred to the left side,
irritation of the left side not again producing reflex
movements until there was a fresh transference of
insensibility. Puppies deprived of sleep produced on
me, and those who were associated with me in the
experiment, the same impression as if they slept

1 For these and similar experiments see Marie de Manacei’ne, “ Sup-
pl^ance d’un hemisphere cerebral par I’autre,” Arch, Hal. de Biologie,
1894.

142

SLEEI‘.

sometimes on one side of the body, sometimes on
the other. In other words, the cerebral hemispheres
seemed to supplement each other periodically, one
acting while the other was inactive.

Prom another side, Wigan’s theory has received
support from the experiments of Professor Goltz,
who, on removing the left hemisphere of a dog’s
brain, observed that the animal presented very few
changes when compared to normal dogs. The dog
with one hemisphere presented some enfeeblement
of intelligence, the muscles were not so strong, and
sensibility was less perfect on the right side than
on the left ; but to a superficial observer he seemed
completely normal. In presence of this fact Goltz
concluded that cerebral tumours and similar affections
may safely be treated by surgical methods, provided
the disease is limited to one hemisphere.

If we could admit with Wigan that each cerebral
hemisphere represents a complete brain, we could
explain double consciousness by supposing that in
this case the hemispheres predominate in turn, the
general consciousness binding together the two being
absent ; each hemisphere acts by its own conscious-
ness, the anatomical basis which unites the elements
of consciousness being in a state of inactivity.

All these hypotheses seem, however, to be in-
sufficient in face of the cases to which I have
already referred, in which there are more than
two states of consciousness. In a case studied and
described by Bourru and Burot there were not less
than six successive states of consciousness, each with
its own tastes, inclinations, knowledge, memory,
character, and even physical symptoms, in the
paralyses and anaesthesias affecting the patient. Such

hibliographv.

143

a case resists explanation, unless we assume that the
brain as a whole becomes segregated into various
districts which work successively.^ Or we might be
content to adopt the easy explanation that such
cases are simply examples of the perverse simulation
often found in hysterical subjects. But then we
should still have to ask what simulation is. More-
over, we have to admit that there is a gradual pro-
gression from the simplest cases of sleep-walking
to the most extraordinary phenomena of divided
consciousness.

We have thiis still kept strictly within the region
of pathological sleep. The most elaborate and de-
veloped states of multiple personality are, as Azam
has shown, simply states of total somnambulism,
and such persons are nothing else than somnambu-
lists all whose senses and faculties are active.^ We
may accept this conclusfon while admitting that we
are incapable of explaining the pathological symptoms
either of sleep or of consciousness. We may, how--
ever, console ourselves with the thought that this
impotence cannot last, and that the time will come
when the progress of investigation will enable us to
reach and to explain even this obscure region of our
life.

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Mackenzie, J. Gumming. — Circulation in the Cranium
during Sleep and Sleeplessness, Journal of Menial
Science, January 1891, vol. xxxvii.

Mackenzie, S. — Report on Chorea, The British Medical
Journal, 26th February 1887, vol. i.

ISO SLEEP.

Henle.— Ueber das Gedachtniss in den Sinnen, Wochen-
schrift fiir die gesammie Hei/kunde, 1838, p, 285.

Browne, Crichton. — Acute Dementia, West Hiding Luna-
tic Asylum Medical Reports, 1874, vol. iv.

Ball, B. — Hemianaesthesia removed by Static Electricity,
The Lancet, 2nd October 1880.

Matthaei. — Horn's Archiv. fur medizinische Erfahrung,
June 1815.

Heidenhain. — Ueber Hypnotismus, Deutsche medizhiische
Woche7ischrift, 21st February 1880.

Jackson, Hughlings. — On AutomaticActionsduringComa,
Medical Tunes and Gazette, 1875, vol. i.

Gairdner. — Abnormal Disposition to Sleep, Edinburgh
Medical Journal, July 1871.

Laycock. — A Chapter on some Organic Laws of personal
and ancestral Memory, The Journal of Metital Science,
1875, No. 94. ^ ^

Broca. — Deutsche medizinische Wochenschrift, 6th November
1886.

Salvages. — Nosologia methodica, Amsterdam, 1768, vol, i.

Marshall Hall. — Medico-Chirurgical Transactions, 1839,
vol. IV., 2nd series.

Huxley, Thomas. — An Address on the Theories of Life and
Motion, The British Medical Journal, 29th August
1874.

Wynter. — The Borderland of Insanity, 1875.

Narrative of the United States Exploring Expedition, vol. i.,
p. 125.

Treviranus. — Biologie, Bd. v., p. 458.

Regnard. — Sorcellerie, Magnetisme, Morphinisme, Ddlire
des grandeurs, 1887.

MacCauley, Clay. — Seminole Indians of Florida, Fifth
Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1883-84,
pp. 493 et seq.

Carpenter. — Elements of Mental Physiology, 1864, pp. 654
et seq.

Beard. — The Nature and Phenomena of Trance, Archives
of Electrology and New'ology, 1875, New York, vol. ii.,
No. I.

Prichard. — Edhiburgh Philosophical Transactions, 1840.

Combe.-— Edmburgh Phrenological Journal, October 1838..

The British and Foreign Medical Journal, 1845, vol. xix.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. I^I

Brown-Sequard. — The Medical and Surgical Reporter,
1874, vol. XXX.

J ESSEN. — Doppeltes Bewusstsein, Allgemeine Zeiischrift fur
Rsychiatrie, 1865, Bd. xxii.

Dunn. — Case of Suspension of Mental Faculties, etc., The
Laficet, 1845, vol. ii.

Forbes Winslow. — Obscure Diseases of the Brain and
Mind, p. 335.

Carpenter. — Mental Physiology, 1873, pp. 479 el seq.

Hack Tuke.— Art. Sleep, Diet, of Psych. Medicine, 1892. _

Mayo. — Case of Double Consciousness, The London Medi-
cal Journal, 1845, vol. I., p. 1202.

Diderot. — CEuvr.es completes. Edition 1875, t. ii., pp. 162
ei seq.

Abercrombie. — Researches on the Pathology of the Brain,
The Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal, 1819,
vol. XV., pp. 23

Wigan. — A New View of Insanity, The Duality of Mind,
1844, p. 46.

Bourru and Burot (P.). — De la multiplicite des etats de
conscience chez un hystero-epileptique. Revue philoso-
phique de la France et de h stranger, 1885, t. xx. ;
Variations de la personnalite. Paris, 1888.

Mitchell and Nott. — Medical Repository, Jan. 1816.

Macnish. — Philosophy of Sleep, 1830.

Dufay. — La notion de la personnalite. Revue scientfique,
15th July 1876.

Azam. — Double conscience et alterations de la personnalite.
Paris, 1887, Bibliotlitque scie7itifique contemporame,
1887.

Ribot. — Maladies de la memoire ; Maladies de la person-
nalitd Paris, 1885.

Richet, Charles. — Revue philosophique, March 1883.

Janet, Pierre. — Revue philosophique, Dec. 1886.

Mackenzie, Stephen. — The Sleeping Sickness of Africa,
Iransactions oj the Clinical Society of London, 1891,
vol. XXIV.

Trowbridge. — Philadelphia Medical News, 21st Feb. 1891.

Manaceine, Marie de. — Suppl^ance d’un hemisphere
cerebral par I’autre, Archives italiennes de Biologic,
t. XXL, fasc. 2, 1894.

Ambulatory Automatism, Lancet, 20th April 1889.

152

SLEEP.

Mitchell, J. K. — Disorders of Sleep, Wilson and Eshner’s
Applied Therapeutics, 1896, pp. 1138 et seq.
Irancotte, X. — Du Somnambulisnie alcoolique, Compte
Rendu Qiiairihne Congrcs (1896) d' Anthropologie
Cr inline! le^ p. 12.

153

CHAPTER III.

the hygiene of sleep.

How much Sleep is necessary?— Lowering of the Body Tempera-
^ ture under the Influence

ingan increase oj Sleep in Old Age-The Eflet of Habi ^
steel)— The injurious Effects of Excessive Sleep— Tempor
ary^ Albuminuria caused by Prolonged Sleep -Nocturnal
piralysis-The Conditions favourable to the
of AncEmia-Infants at the breast should not
long— Methods of combating the excessive Tendency to Sl^p
—Methods of combating the Tendency to Insomnia H
Baths— The Application of Cold Water to the hlead
Supper— Injurious Effects of burdening
Influence of Light-T he Effects of

ness is feared— The Temperature of the Bedrooni— The
Effects of Impure Air— The Position of the Bop during
Sleep— The Hour for Pising— Ventilation and Sunlight—
The Habit of Breathing through the Mouth— Sudden pans
in Sleep— Dreams of falling or flying— Meep during
Illness— The Sleep of Consumptives— Sleep in Cardiac
Affections— The Influence of Tobacco— 1 he Hypnagogic
State.

Since we devote so much of our life to sleep, it
is natural to ask how, and how long, we ought to

sleep.

Amount of Time to he devdted to Sleep. Usually the
amount of sleep is in an inverse ratio to the strength
and development of consciousness; thus children need
more sleep than adults, since the development of con-
sciousness is moving more or less parallel with increase
of age. In infants at the breast consciousness is^ so
feebly developed that a very brief period of waking

154

SLEEP.

life suffices to produce exhaustion. Owing to the
demands of rapid growth the phenomena of meta-
bolism and nutrition predominate over those of active
circulation. The labours of Soltmann, Tarchanoff,
and others have shown that the anatomical mechanism
of the higher intellectual processes remains in a rudi-
mentary state for some time after birth. During the
first day or two, as Preyer has shown, the infant
even shows no signs of sensibility when pricked with
a pin, and the ability to speak only begins to appear
very slowly and gradually, after many months. At
this period the sleeping must necessarily predominate
over the waking state, the unconscious reflex life over
the conscious intellectual life.

Moreover, nurses, servants, and sometimes even
mothers, like young children to sleep as long as
possible, for the selfish reason that the longer the
child sleeps the more free time they have. In
presence of this fact it is necessary to remember that
prolonged sleep may be harmful, since consciousness
requires exercise for its development, and thus the
new-born infant must not be allowed to pass all its
hours in sleep. For the same reason all the methods
of putting children to sleep artificially by means of
monotonous sensations ought to be proscribed, in-
cluding monotonous and unmusical lullabies and the
rocking of babies in cradles or simply in the arms.

I have found by direct experiment that swinging, even
for only a quarter of an hour, produces in healthy
adults a lowering of temperature of 0.5'’ C, and
more or less pronounced phenomena of brain anaemia
and pain at the heart. The decrease of temperature
may be as much as 1.5“ C, and Alexandre in the
beginning of the century even proposed to swing

THE TIME DEVOTED TO SLEEP. 1 55

patients in fever to reduce the temperature. Rocking
a child in the arms or the cradle produces sleep
artificially, partly because consciousness is fatigued
by a series of monotonous sensations, and partly be-
cause at the same time artificial anaemia of the brain is
provoked. Those authors who assert that the cradle
is a fruitful source of human stupidity, and even of
idiocy, have not therefore been altogether wrong,
though they supported their assertions by no experi-
mental facts. In Germany it is proverbial to say,
“He has been .rocked into stupidity;’ which seems
to indicate that the injurious effect of the cradle on
infants has been popularly recognised.

It is, therefore, undesirable either to interrupt or to
artificially produce or prolong the sleep of infants
and young children. During the first four or six
weeks of life there ought to be two waking hours
during the day, and as tlie baby grows the duiation
of this period should gradually increase. Between
the ages of one and two years, children need i8 to
1 6 hours of sleep out of the 24; between two and
three years of age, 17 to 15 hours; between three and
four years, 16 to 14 hours; between four and six yeais,
15 to 13 hours; between six and nine years, 12 to 10
hours; between nine and thirteen years, from lO to
8 hours. At the critical age of puberty, during the
transition from childhood to adolescence, the duration
of sleep should be somewhat augmented. At the
end of this period it may be reduced to from seven
to nine hours; and only after the completion of
growth, at the age of nineteen or twenty, can it be
safely brought as low as 6 to 8 hours a day. Those
who have reached middle age, the age at which
consciousness and the other psychic faculties have

SLEEP.

156

attained the zenith of their development, may content
tliemselves with even less, but only so long’ as they
aie ill perfect health. On the whole it may be said
that eight hours is, on the average, the amount which
adults may most wisely devote to slcep.^

As regards the aged, the amount of sleep must vary
with the state of consciousness and the degree of its
enfeeblement. If as old age approaches consciousness
grows weaker, together with the intellectual sphere
generally, the need for sleep is the same as with
young children; I have already mentioned the case
of the distinguished French mathematician, Moivre,
who slept twenty hours a day during the last years of
his life. In such cases there is a marked enfeeble-
ment of memory also, as was the case with Linnaeus,
who in old age, having taken down one of his own
books, immediately forgot that it was his and ex-
claimed with -delight as he read it, “How fine this is !
What would I not give to have written that ! ”

If, however, the intellectual powers are well pre-
served in old age, the need for sleep is much less, and
we may even firfd a tendency to insomnia. This is
easily explained, since the conditions of life in old

^ This was the conclusion reached by Dr. Binns in his interesting
old work on The Anatomy of Sleep, p. 36: “Alfred,” he remarks,
“divided the twenty-four hours in the following manner: eight hours
for rest, eight hours for labour, and eight hours for amusement.
Jeremy Taylor allowed but three hours of the twenty-four for sleep;
Baxter, four; Wesley, six; Lord Coke and Sir William Jones, seven;
Sir John Sinclair and Dr. Elliotson eight hours of the twenty-four.
Nine, however, will frequently be found not too much for literary
men.” It is said that Bismarck and Gladstone in old age both sleep
eight hours; Zola only sleeps. seven hours. Many other great men —
such as Goethe, Napoleon, Humboldt, Mirabeau, etc. — have devoted
even less time to sleep. Kant, who only slept for seven hours, though
in old age he was obliged to increase this amount, regarded the bed as
the nest of diseases.

. F,XCESS OF SLEEP,

157

age more or less remove the causes of the exhaustion
of consciousness. We may recall that in persons of
advanced years the passions retire into the back-
ground, while the tastes, convictions, and character
become more fixed. Consequently we rarely find
that internal contest of the man with himself, that
struggle of noble ideals with selfish tendencies
which consumes so much of the strength and
health of youth. It is clear that in the absence
of this internal struggle, old men who have preserved
their vigour must become much less fatigued than
adults; hence they are liable to insomnia.

Bearing in mind that an excess of sleep leads to a
still further enfeeblement of consciousness, in old age
as in infancy, and thus is harmful, old men, and all
those who have an undue tendency to sleep, should
be counselled to abstain from suppers, for Durham s
observations have shown that the introduction of food
before sleep considerably increases the brain anaemia
which accompanies sleep. Massage of the body and
cold baths may also be recommended, and friction
with a sponge and cold water.

However great the tendency to sleep, the aged
should not sleep for more than ten hours, only in
cases of marked feebleness for twelve hours, and
then there should be two periods of sleep. It must
be remembered that the organism grows accustomed to
everything, even to what is injurious. Thus by habit it
is easy to sleep at any hour of the day, in a particular
position, or under the influence of a particular sensa-
tion. People sometimes fall asleep by putting the
hands into a certain position, or by looking at a bright
object (Hammond, Ball). Those persons who have
an exaggerated tendency to sleep should therefore

158

SLEEP.

combat it as far as possible, or it may increase by mere
habit. It is clear that the phenomena of nutrition
and the renewal of the tissues cannot be prolonged
indefinitely; they are limited by the demands of the
preceding expenditure. If, therefore, a man sleeps
longer than the repose of consciousness and the
repair of the tissues require, there will, in the first
place, be an enfeeblement of consciousness from lack of
exercise, and, in the second place, an adaptation of the
vessels to an abnormal state of the nutritive circula-
tion, to the detriment of the functional circulation;
consequently we may have ground to apprehend
trouble in the respiratory exchange and an over-
production of carbonic acid — not a matter of in-
difference to the organism, which may sooner or later
be injured thereby.

The nutrition of the brain may deviate from the
normal standard, not only quantitatively but also
qualitatively, and thus, for example, receive too large
an amount of lecithin and albuminoid substances
(Hughlings Jackson, Thudichum); some authors at-
tribute epilepsy, a disease involving the interruption
of consciousness and tending to produce stupidity
and even idiocy, precisely to this excess of albuminoid
alimentation. I have already mentioned that epileptic
fits frequently appear during nocturnal sleep. At-
tempts have been made to treat epilepsy on the one
hand by a diminution of albuminoids in the diet, and
on the other by the ligature of the vertebral arteries
in the neck (Alexander, Reyer), both with a certain
success. Food may thus be injurious either quantita-
tively or qualitatively, and by excessive albuminoid
nutrition. From my own personal observations I have
gained the conviction that too much sleep is equally

EVILS OF EXCESSIVE SLEEP. 159

harmful at all ages of life. In childhood, especially,
it over-develops the vegetative life of the organism,
simultaneously enfeebling the cerebral nervous system.
If we compare the children who sleep much with those
who sleep little it is easy to see that the fiist are
better nourished and fatter, but the muscular system
is often much weaker than in the normal condition.
At the same time they exhibit the phlegmatic tempera-
ment and a delay in intellectual development. On
the other hand, children who sleep little are for the
most part nervous and precocious. The normal
development of the intellectual powers — neither too
slow nor too hasty — demands that there should
neither be excess nor deficiency of sleep, but corre-
spondence to the real needs of the organism.

The Effects of Excessive Sleep. — Since sleep is
accompanied by more or less inactivity of the chief
organs and tissues of the body, and all prolonged
inactivity leads to enfeeblement, excessive sleep must
necessarily weaken the vessel walls, which may lead
further to serious consequences. I may mention as
an example that by repeated observations I have
found that a prolonged sleep of ten or twelve hours
in childhood, and more especially during adolescence,
may lead to temporary albuminuria. And it is well
known that the presence of albumen in the urine,
even if the kidneys are quite healthy, is always a
disturbing symptom, for it indicates that the renal
tissue is becoming habituated to allow the albumen
to filter through, and so in the long run to interfere
with the normal functions of organs of the first
importance for life. Such albuminuria is always
observed in those boys or girls who, once in bed,
sleep continuously till morning, not waking even

SLKI'l'.

T^O

to empty the bladder. On awakening they dis-
charge ail abundant amount of healthy urine; a few
hours later, however, after walking, playing, etc.,
it is much less in amount, but is found to be
albuminous. Towards evening it again becomes
normal, notwithstanding the fatigue of the organism.
The oiigin of this kind of albuminuria may be easily
explained ; during the ten or twelve hours of sleep
so laige an amount of urine has accumulated in the
kidnep, ureters, and bladder, that all these organs
are distended and their tone enfeebled. When the
child awakes, the discharge of the accumulated urine
is not sufficient to restore the normal tonicity of the
tissues ; the blood pressure in the kidneys is increased
in the standing or sitting posture, and under these
influences the renal tissue allows more or less albumen
to pass out of the blood. The correctness of this
explanation is shown by the fact that if we awake
children after four or five hours’ sleep and make them
empty the bladder, albumen disappears completely
from the mine of the day. The mechanism by which
albuminuria develops in such cases thus recalls that
observed during compression of the ureter. No
attention is at present paid to this source of albu-
minuria, because it is unfortunately not considered
necessary to examine the urine of apparently healthy
persons. My own observations have convinced me
that albuminuria due to such retention of urine as I
have described, continuing for a year or two, may
gradually inciease so that the amount of urine during
the day may be 2 per 1000. Evidently the renal
tissue becomes habituated to this passage of albumen.

It is obvious that these losses of albumen must
weaken the nutrition and energy of the organism,

SLEEP IN OLD AGE.

l6l

and at the same time prove a possible source of
serious disease of the kidneys, as Noorden has
shown in treating the question of physiological
albuminuria.

This example will, I think, suffice to show that
prolonged sleep may not only be injurious to
psychic health, but also to physical health, even
in youth.

In old age the tonicity of the tissues is already
more or less enfeebled, and excessive sleep must act
upon them still more perniciously, contributing to
produce various forms of blood stasis, and reacting on
the general nutritive phenomena of the organism ;
in some cases such stasis, comb n:d with enfeebled
tonicity of the vessels, may lead to the forms of
apoplexy due to haemorrhage. Excessive sleep may
also prove injurious from the absence of habitual stimu-
lation, and from uniformity of position. We all know
the unpleasant results of numbness of the extremities;
but sometimes uniformity of position during sleep
provokes not only numbness and insensibility of the
limbs, but also complete paralysis, as direct observa-
tion has shown. In medical literature we may find
a series of cases of nocturnal paralysis, as described
by Weir Mitchell, Ormerod, Sinclair, Saundby, F6r^,
Schreiber, and others.

Excessive rest in bed may also lead in adults and
the aged to the development of biliary calculi, since
during peaceful and prolonged sleep there is a stasis
of bile in the gall bladder, still further favoured by
the slackening or arrest of the peristaltic movements
of the intestines and by the position adopted in
sleep, which may prevent the flow of bile into the
duodenum from many physical reasons, such as the

SLEEP.

162

compression of the gall duct. During stagnation of
bile its liquid portions arc absorbed, and it thus
becomes thicker and more easily tends to form
biliary calculi and gravel. A similar condition in
the urinary passages may form the starting-point of
stone in the kidney or the bladder, and for this
reason also it is desirable to avoid a prolonged stasis
of the renal secretion in the urinary passages.

I may remark also, in passing, that prolonged
sleep, by enfeebling the tone of the digestive canal,
contributes to develop habitual constipation with all
its unpleasant results. In early childhood as well
as in youth there is often much suffering due to
obstinate constipation, and by attentively investigat-
ing such cases we may discover that these subjects
sleep too much ; it is sometimes sufficient to make
them get up earlier, to cure obstinate consti-
pation and improve the general nutrition of the
organism.

An eminent English physician. Sir Andrew Clark,
attempted to explain the development of anaemia in
young girls by the influence of the obstinate con-
stipation with which it is usually associated, and he
even proposed to call anaemia or chlorosis simply
faecal anaemia. He was only mistaken on one
point : obstinate constipation is not so much the
essential cause of the disorder as one of its mani-
festations. In my opinion the cause should rather
be found in albuminuria, which has developed from
not being recognised in time. In support of this
opinion I may refer to the fact, pointed out by many
authorities, that albuminuria is frequently found in
young girls and young people generally at the period
of puberty, although there is every reason to con-

SLEEP AND ANEMIA.

163

sidcr the kidneys healthy. In these cases the
albumen is constantly observed in the urine dis-
charged during the day.^

It must not be forgotten, also, that anaemic young
women are always remarkable for their sleepiness ;
they adore sleep, they cannot bear their sleep to be
interrupted! For this reason we may very often find
that they allow an excessive amount of urine to
accumulate during the night, thus dilating the urinary
passages, and, as I have already pointed out, this
may lead to the development of habitual physiological
albuminuria, which, gradually increasing, may finally
produce all the results of severe anaemia and patholo-
gical albuminuria. In treating chlorosis it is thus
desirable to diminish the time devoted to sleep, and
also to avoid too prolonged a retention of the urine
during the night. We must also bear in mind that
in adolescence, the period of sexual development,
the blood is specially drawn to the organs of the
pelvis and the abdominal cavity, and consequently
that any derangement in the normal course of the
renal functions may easily have injurious effects.
Under the influence of general disturbances of nutri-
tion and excessive sleep the muscular tone of the
digestive passages becomes weak; obstinate constipa-
tion appears ; and these conditions, again, react harm-
fully on the state of the kidneys and the general
nutrition of the organism.

After all that has gone before, it will easily be
understood that even infants at the breast need not

1 Among the authors who have dealt with the question are Vogel,
Gull, Morley Rooke, Clement Dukes, Moxon, Randall, Capitan’,
Furbringer, etc. For references see the bibliography at the end of this
chapter.

164

SLEEP.

only time to sleep but also time to wake. Continuous
cerebral anaemia must necessarily enfeeble the brain.
Its conscious activity is always accompanied by a
marked afflux of blood to the organ, and very active
cerebral circulation ; consciousness is thus developed
gradually and increased by continuous exercise and
persevering work. The law which regulates de-
velopment and growth is the same for all the
tissues and all the aptitudes of the organism ; and
just as a muscle which is always at rest atrophies,
grows weak and disappears, so it is also with an
inactive nerve, the sense organs, the anatomical
mechanism of the different psychic functions when
unused.

For those persons who show an excessive tendency
to sleep, all those means are useful which produce a
notable afflux of blood towards the brain : stimulating
drinks like tea and coffee, pleasant society, amuse-
ments, etc. In this connection it is interestingr to
note the case communicated by Erasmus Darwin. A
friend of his was obliged to ride much and conse-
quently often became very fatigued; sometimes he
was so tired and sleepy that he could scarcely keep
on his saddle; but he found that to remove the
painful feeling of fatigue it sufficed to think of
something that irritated him ; his anger accelerated
the circulation and acted as a stimulant. Some
physicians even regard favourably the exaggerated
irritability of exhausted and anaemic persons, since
by becoming perpetually angry over insignificant
trifles these persons improve their cerebral circulation
and consequently their general health. For these
reasons it may be advantageous for somnolent
persons to engage in warm discussion, to play at

HYGIENE OF EXCESSIVE SLEEP. 165

cards, even to give way to anger, for in so doing they
provoke an afflux of blood to the brain.

Joy also causes the blood to flow to the brain and
so directly stimulates the functions of the central
nervous system, and indirectly the whole organism.
Ambroise Pare was thus to some extent right when
he said that in disease the cheerful recover more
easily than the sad. It must be remembered that the
tendency to somnolence may be observed not only in
children and the aged, but also in adult age and even
in young people, when it may be caused by idleness
and inactivity, the absence of all absorbing interests
and occupations. On this ground we can well under-
stand the tendency to sleep shown by children,
savages, and the uneducated, when not occupied, for
their psychic world is so poor that it is almost impos-
sible for them to find any interest in their own
thoughts and ideas. They^ always need stimulation,
impressions from the external world, or they fall
asleep under the influence of the monotony of their
own internal world. We must therefore procure
them occupations, in no serious sense of the world,
but such as correspond to the general level of their
psychic development. There are persons who find
a serious and interesting occupation in observing
whether all their clocks strike simultaneously or in a
certain order ; others devote the time left over from
sleep and meals to the care and feeding of birds, etc.;
others again occupy themselves with table-turning,
playing at patience, and so on. Such occupations,
proportioned to the intelligence of each, are necessary
to overcome the exaggerated and harmful tendency
to sleep.

The Hygiene of Insomnia. — Leaving the subject of

SLEEP.

166

excessive and superfluous sleep, we must now turn
to that of insufficient sleep, with the causes of which
we were concerned in the last chapter. I have
already pointed out that it is not rare among the aged
who have preserved their intellectual energy, and who,
in consequence of the natural conditions of their age,
have no sufficient reason to fatigue consciousness.
Insomnia is observed at other ages of life, but is rare
in children, in whom it indicates great excitement of
the central nervous system; such children should be
carefully examined. There is often obstinate in-
somnia which consists not of a complete absence
of sleep, but of light, brief, and interrupted periods
of sleep disappearing under the influence of the
slightest noise or any external stimulus. Such light
and broken sleep is harmful, because it gives the
tissues no time for repair, and after such a night,
passed in alternately drowsy and waking states, there
is no refreshment, but on the contrary a feeling of
greater fatigue, with exaggerated excitability and
inability to accomplish serious intellectual work.

Since normal sleep demands the fatigue of con-
sciousness and the production of cerebral anaemia, it
is evident that whatever will induce these conditions
serves to combat insomnia. The subjects of insomnia
should, therefore, devote their evenings to uniform
occupations in a uniform environment, avoiding visits
or any source of excitement. As a sedentary life
develops irregularities of the circulation, they should
also be careful to take sufficient physical exercise.
Under the influence of civilisation many classes of
society suffer from lack of sufficient muscular exercise.
To realise the extent to which civilisation has elimi-
nated muscular labour from daily life, it is sufficient to

INSOMNIA.

167

recall that in order to supply the amount of flour
necessary to feed the household of Penelope twelve
women had to grind at the mill day and night; while
to-day, by means of mills worked by machinery, it is
easy to prepare in the same time sufflcient flour to
feed five thousand men. In other words, the amount
of manual labour which to-day suffices to feed five
thousand men would then only suffice to feed ten or at
most twenty. In the same way mechanical methods
of locomotion have largely rendered unnecessary both
walking and riding. The dreams of Aristotle con-
cerning self-acting mills and weaving shuttles are
completely realised, not, however, without unfortunate
consequences on the one hand in the growth of a
proletariat, and on the other in lack of useful muscular
labour.

Warm baths in the evening greatly contribute to
prevent insomnia, if properly carried out. As recom-
mended by Eccles and 'others, the bath should be
taken in a room with a temperature of 65“ to 70"
Fahr. The patient should stand with his head over
the edge of the tub, douching head and face with
water at 100° The cooling of the body by the air and
the hot sponging of the head first send blood to the
brain, dilating its vessels. Then the entire body, except
the head, is immersed in a bath at 98“, rapidly raised to
105° or 110°; in a few minutes the bath is left, and
the body wrapped in blankets which absorb the
moisture, and with the least possible exertion the
patient gets into his night clothes, and to bed, with
a warm bottle to his feet, and perhaps a little warm
liquid food. The sedative and refreshing results of
this process are often very marked.

When for any reason it is undesirable to use hot

i68

SLEEP.

baths, the application of cold water in india-rubber
bags is often useful. In the same way, standing in
cold water and then rubbing the feet with a rough
towel may be recommended. To lie with the back
of the neck on a hot-water bottle, as Broadbent has
pointed out, is another method of setting up local
hyperaemia, and thus reducing cerebral arterial tension
and promoting sleep.^ In this connection it is in-
teresting to note that, as Binns pointed out, Spanish
women are accustomed to get their children to sleep
by rubbing the spine between the cervical and the
lumbar vertebrae with the hands.^

Altdorfer’s method of combating insomnia is to
envelop the body in warm wraps, thus producing
peripheral dilatation and cerebral anaemia. In ex-
treme cases we may envelop the body in moist
sheets, covered by dry wraps (Becker, Schuller, and
others). Such methods act by lowering arterial
tension and producing anaemia of the brain. We
must remember, however, that, as was pointed out in
the last chapter, very low arterial tension will also
cause sleeplessness, and in such cases less depressing
methods must be adopted.

A light supper is desirable for those who suffer
from insomnia, since the introduction of food into the
stomach causes a flow of blood to the digestive organs,
with concomitant cerebral anaemia/Holland, Durham,
Becker, etc.), and in feeble subjects this is often a
satisfactory and sufficient method of inducing sleep.
It is obvious that such meals should not be copious
or formed of indigestible food, for in such a case,
digestion being overburdened, and the food tending
to accumulate in an undigested form, the phenomena
^ Broadbent, Lancet, April 1887. ^ Anatomy of Sleep, 1845, p. 432.

THE HYGIENE OF INSOMNIA. 169

of putrefaction and abnormal fermentation will result,
with injurious consequences to health. An over-
burdened stomach also tends to produce night-
mares which more or less disturb the tranquil course
of normal sleep. It must also be remembered that
the stomach and intestines when full displace the
diaphragm upwards, instead of allowing it to main-
tain a state of relaxation (Mosso). The upward
displacement of the diaphragm necessarily diminishes
the volume of the lungs; according to Gerhaidt, this
diminution is equal to i cubic centimetre for every
24 centimetres of liquid introduced into the stomach,
and Fabius, on the other hand, has shown that the
volume of the lungs largely increases in healthy
subjects after the use of aperients. The pulmonary
or vital capacity has a direct relationship to the
question of sleep, for diminution of pulmonary
capacity involves a corresponding diminution in the
oxidation of the blood— that is to say, in the ab-
sorption of oxygen. We have already seen in
Chapter I. (p. 8) that various experiments, still

unfortunately too few in number, show that there
is an exaggerated absorption of oxygen during sleep,
the formation, as it were, of a reserve for use during
waking life. Diminution of the pulmonary capacity,
by more or less limiting the absorption of oxygen by
the red blood corpuscles, thus interrupts the regular
course of the physiological process during sleep, and
the diminution of intra-molecular oxygen necessarily
weakens the activity of all the organs and impairs
nutrition.

It has long been known that an overburdened
digestive canal exerts an injurious influence on the
general health, and especially on the psychic con-

170

SLEEP.

ition. Schroeder van der Kolk many years ago
showed that it may not only cause a gloomy and
melancholy state of mind, but actually lead to serious
mental disease. The witty Voltaire alluded to this
fact when he remarked that before asking a favour
of a ministei we should “ adroitly ascertain whether
his bowels are acting freely.” It may also be re-
maiked that, as by relieving the bowels we reduce
general arterial tension, we may thus, as Broadbent
recommends, often promote sleep by giving an

aperient, even if the bowels are already acting
regularly.

People who find difficulty in getting to sleep are
often aided by attending to monotonous sounds, such
as the ticking of a watch beneath the pillow. Uni‘
formity of sounds quickly exhausts consciousness and
so induces somnolence; and any monotonous sensa-
tion auditory, visual, or tactile — may act in the same
way.^

The Influence of Light, Air, etc. — Those who are in-
clined to excessive sleep should have no curtains to
the windows of their bed-rooms, so that the light of
day may have free access, and prepare the sleeper to

^ From observation of many subjects of different ages I have become
convinced that while late dinners and suppers are injurious to all, they
are especially so to those with diseased livers. Probably the most
natural time for a substantial meal is between 12 and 3 o’clock.

® Southey, in The Doctor, thus summarises some of the chief devices
to attain sleep by monotony: “ 1 listened to the river and to the ticking
of my watch ; I thought of all sleepy sounds and of all soporific things —
the flow of water, the humming of bees, the motion of a boat, the
waving of a field of corn, the nodding of a mandarin’s head on the
chimney-piece, a horse in a mill, the opera, Mr. Humdrum’s conver-
sations, Mr. Proser’s poems, Mr. Laxative’s speeches, Mr. Lengthy’s
sermons. I tried the device of my own childhood, and fancied that
the bed rushed with me round and round. At length Morpheus

THE INFLUENCE OF LIGFIT. I?!

awake by a series of preliminary sensations; for, as
Mosso has shown, a ray of light falling on a sleepei s
eyelids stimulates activity in the nervous centres and
increases the blood-supply of the brain. Those, on
the contrary, who are subject to insomnia should
have curtains to all the windows, for, in consequence
of the excessive excitability of their nervous systems,
even a feeble ray of light may easily awaken them
too early, before the processes of sleep are accom-

plished. _ ■ -u u

To understand the enormous influence which light

exerts on the organism it is sufficient to remeniber
that in darkness, during the waking state, we elimi-
nate much less carbonic acid than in daylight, as
Fubini and Ronchi have shown. The same pheno-
menon has been observed in animals by Moleschott,
Platen, Selmi, and Piacentini, so that we are here

in presence of a general law.

A special interest attaches to those experiments in
which the animals were not shut up in the dark, but
merely prevented from seeing the light; it was found
that if the eyelids were merely closed by diachylon
plaster there was some alteration in the respiratory

reminded me of Dr. Torpedo’s Divinity Lectures, where the voice, the
manner, the matter, even the very atmosphere and the streaming
candle-light, were all alike soporific ; when he who, by strong effort,
lifted up his head and forced open the reluctant eyes never failed to
see all around him asleep. Lettuces, cowslip wine, poppy syrup,
mandragora, hop pillows, spider’s web pills, and the whole tribe of
narcotics, up to bang and the black drop, would have failed— but this
was irresistible; and thus, twenty years after date, I found benefit from
having attended the course.” (The insomnia from which Southey
himself suffered as a result of close and affectionate attendance upon
his sick wife, is said to have been the starting-point of his subsequent
insanity.) Reference may also be made to Wordsworth’s well-known
sonnet V “ A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by,” etc.

'7-3

sli:k]>.

cluingcs (riaten). Dewar found by direct observation
that under the influence of light on the eye the
energy of the brain underwent remarkable modifi-
cation;^ and the great importance of light for the
tissues is further shown by the observations regarding
the effects of electric light in relieving pain (Stein,
NetchaiefQ. The importance of light for the con-
scious intellectual life is so great that, as Purkinje
pointed out many years ago, a better illumination of
our houses by windows and good illuminants, and a
perfected system of street lighting, should distinctly
favour the growth of social life. Light not only
drives away sleepiness but increases the general
activity and enlarges the sum-total of consciousness.
In the extreme north, with its endless night, psychic
life attains a very low degree of development, and
a distinguished observer (Johannes Miiller) has re-
marked that in darkness we can never be so witty
and intelligent as in the light. This is evident when
we lemember that darkness, especially when combined
with silence, deprives us of our habitual sensations
due to stimuli from the external world, leaving the
world of reflex acts to predominate. The chief
surgeon to the great works at Cyfarthfa, in Wales,

^ “The darkness at midday at Conger was such,” says Greely,
“for nearly two months in mid-winter, that the time could not be
told from a watch held up with its face to the south. At Fort Conger
stars were to be seen at local noon seven days after the sun had gone
for the winter, and so remained visible in a cloudless sky for over four
months. The effects of this darkness on the spirits and temper of the
men are particularly noticed; in some it produced insomnia, indis-
position to exertion, and in all, irritability of temper. The effect upon
Greely himself is thus described ; “ In my own case, although following
a set routine, it was only with difficulty that I could limit my sleeping
hours to a reasonable number, or apply myself steadily and success-
fully to mental work. While free from mental depression, insomnia,

THE FEAR OF DARKNESS.

173

assured Dr, Macfarlane that miners injured in the
darkness suffer more from shock than those injured in
the light Schopenhauer says that darkness and the
hour of midnight only make us afraid when we are
alone; society and light cause us to forget that mid-
night is the hour of apparitions and ghosts, and he
concludes that in reality it is ourselves that we fear
in darkness, our own ideas and the play of our
sensory organs. A similar remark was made by
Dugald Stewart But in analysing the fear that seizes
men in darkness and the gloomy silence of night, it
must not be forgotten that under these circumstances
the excitations from the outer world are reduced to
a minimum, and the cerebral mechanism is in a state
of temporary repose; we are predisposed to the play
of fancy, to the apparition of various images in the
field of vision and of consciousness, as it were both
to central and peripheral hallucinations; and in
many cases this process 'is aided by dreams. This
is well shown by Professor Stanley Hall in his
elaborate study of fears. Of some forty cases of fear
of darkness which he brings forward, about thirty
contain references to bears, tigers, and fantastic
monsters; no doubt such visions played a part in

and feelings of lassitude which characterised some, yet I was at times
affected by irritability of temper, which it required a continual mental
struggle to repress” (A. W. Greely, Three Years of Arctic Service,
1886, vol. i. p. 15s). The faces of all acquired a pale yellowish-green
colour. The sun was absent from October 15th to February 25th, but
ten days after the sun had disappeared a brilliant mock-sun was seen.
It is remarked that notwithstanding the darkness which has been
described, it was only on a few stormy days that it was too dark to
take regular exercise, and in addition to the light of the moon and
stars, the snow appeared to give out a faint phosphorescent light. The
effect of the darkness on the Eskimo was even greater than on the rest
of the party.

174

SLEEP.

even a larger proportion of the cases. Probably there
are very few persons who have not experienced this
fear of darkness at some period in their lives. Stanley
Hall traces the development of this fear in the tend-
ency of children to strain their eyes into the growing
dark of twilight which threatens to swallow them
like a monster j in the projection outwards of the
processes going on within the eyesj in the visual
images, often not very remote from after-images, seen
in bed, on the canvas of darkness; in the spasmodic
startings on first falling asleep, and the feeling of
terror which accompanies them.i

Having decided on the measure of light which is
desirable in cases of abnormal excess or defect of
sleep, it may be asked whether in cases of normal
sleep the windows of the bedroom should be darkened
by curtains. We must be guided by circumstances in
this respect. If the windows have a north or west
aspect — that is to say, if they are so placed that no

^ G. Stanley Hall, “A Study of Fears,” Am. Journ. of* Psych.,
1897, pp, 183-189. Professor Hall makes the following suggestive
observations on this subject: — “ Children who gloat over horrors may be
instinctively applying strong stimuli to develop the rude, early stages

of imagination, as we pinch ourselves to keep awake. . . . It is in those
drifting automatic states so favoured by darkness, and sometimes even
by fatigue, when the imagination is laying the basis of mind and first
divorcing thought from sense, that the soul feels the pain of its old
scars received in the long struggle by which intelligence unfolded out
of instinct and instinct out of reflexes. In the past the pain field has
been incalculably larger than the pleasure field, and so potent is this
past that its influence dominates the most guarded child, in whom
otherwise the pleasure field should be relatively the largest anywhere
to be found. Now, darkness and the unknown alike have few terrors j
once they had little else. The old night ol ignorance, mother of fears,
still rules our nerves and pulses in the dark, despite our better know-
ledge. Lacking this latter, children fall still more aljjectly under her
spell. Hence it is that animals found only in distant lands or long

THE BEDROOM.

175

direct morning sunlight can enter — it is best to leave
them without curtains, or using only white blinds of
calico or similar material when the demands of pro-
priety make it desirable to mask the windows. If the
windows face the east, similar blinds will preserve
the sight from the rays of the rising sun when the
period for awakening arrives.

Since we are now occupied with the bedroom it
may be as well to add all that remains to be said
on this subject. A good bedroom should be spacious,
since we need much fresh air when sleeping. Active
ventilation is no.t less necessary; it is evident that
ventilation must be so arranged as to avoid currents
of cold air, since the skin during sleep, in consequence
of the increased perspiration, is very sensitive to cold,
and we are more easily chilled asleep than awake
(Sorgewohl). To increase the supply of fresh air,
the room should not be encumbered with furniture
and draperies. The bed should be placed near the
inner wall, as far as possible from the windows and the

extinct, impossible monsters, ghosts, etc., rarely present, and never
feared in waking consciousness, bear witness again to the remoteness
of the past to which some of the roots of this class of fears penetrate.”
(And see also Sully on the causes of the fear of darkness in child-
hood, Studies of Childhood, 1896, pp. 211-219.) The same effects
are produced by darkness in nervous disease. “The darkness of
the night,” remarks Dr. Macfarlane, “ reduces many a neurasthenic
to the mental level of a child or a savage. In darkness they are
haunted by fears unknown to their daily lives. It has been noted

that in the insane [Lancet, nth April 1891) thoughts grow far
more extravagant in darkness; indeed, a form of nocturnal insanity is
well recognised, characterised by restlessness and excitement, and by
an extravagant mental state, symptoms which completely disappear
during the day. Some patients have curious hallucinations whenever
they shut their eyes. One that seems to be disagreeable is a loss of the
sense of locality; they think their bed is placed in a different position,
etc.”

1/6

SLEEP.

fireplace, in order to avoid the currents of air which
are always strongest at these spots. The temperature
of the room in which healthy people sleep should
always be cool, about 58° or 60° Fahr, Children
during the early years of life need a warmer tem-
perature. During the early days after birth this
temperature should be between 75° and 76° Fahr.;
at the end of the first month it should be lowered
to /4°-y2° Fahr. ; at the end of the second to 70°-68“
Fahr. ; at the end of the first year to 66°-64° Fahr. ;
and in the fourth year children may sleep in a
temperature of 64°-6o° Fahr.

It is easy to discover by experience that a night
spent in a room that is too hot never gives the
sensation of freshness and comfort that is felt in a
cool room. On the contrary, we rise with a feeling
of heaviness in the head, a sensation of fatigue
throughout the body, the face a little swollen, and
the eyelids puffy. This is not surprising, for the
heat of the room increases the perspiration developed
during normal sleep ; it is as if we had taken a hot-
air bath — with this difference, that such a bath never
lasts so long as normal sleep. The increased and
prolonged cutaneous activity may provoke a slight
serous transudation and swelling of the skin. It is
evident that this will inevitably cause fatigue, and,
which is worse, enfeeble the cutaneous vessels and
weaken their normal tone, reacting on the vasomotor
sphere which plays so important a part in the normal
course of physical and psychic life. As a rule, swell-
ing of the face or eyelids on awakening is a sure
index that the conditions of sleep have not been
normal ; either sleep has been excessive, or the
temperature of the room was too high, or the air

VENTILATION.

177

was not pure. If for any reason it is necessary to
sleep in an excessively hot room, we should diminish
the time given up to sleep. As a rule, the higher the
temperature of the room, the less we ought to sleep.
For this reason we should sleep less in summer than
in winter, and less in the south than in the north.

To show that the influence of heat may in more
than one respect reinforce the phenomena that accom-
pany sleep, we may push the analysis of this question
still further. It is well known that under the influence
of heat the peripheral vessels dilate and are gorged
with blood, and that there is simultaneously a relative
anaemia of the internal organs, including the brain.
Sleep acts in the same direction. On the other hand,
it is known that heat weakens the tone of the different
tissues. Exactly the same result is produced by pro-
longed sleep. This explains why nasal and other
haemorrhages have a tendency to appear both during
sleep and under the influence of heat, since in both
cases the tone of the vessel walls is diminished, and
rupture is easier, being still further favoured by the
accompanying dilatation from engorgement. For the
sake of health, therefore, it is necessary either to
maintain a cool temperature in our bedrooms or to
diminish the amount of sleep. It may indeed be
observed that we have a tendency to awake early in
a room that is too hot, and' that sleep under these
conditions is heavier.

Leaving the question of temperature, we may now
turn to that of impure air. We know that there is
normally an accumulation of carbonic acid during
sleep, less being eliminated than during waking life.
At the same time, as we have already seen, there is
an increased absorption of oxygen. If, therefore, the

178

SLEEP.

air of the bedroom is not sufficiently renewed, and
the oxygen is more or less exhausted while the
carbonic acid accumulates, the sleeper, at each in-
spiration, receives too little of the former and too
much of the latter. According to Santorini, during
sleep we eliminate twice as much vapour as when
awake; while Voit’s observations on man have shown
that when the temperature of the room is below
14°- 1 3° C. the elimination of carbonic acid increases,
while other experiments, on cats, have shown that
fresh air contributes to the elimination of carbonic
acid and the absorption of oxygen, while heat increases
the loss in the form of vapour.

Thus there can be no doubt that the air of the
bedroom should be as cool and pure as possible,
while the bed-clothes should never be put over the
mouth, thus leading to repeated breathing of the
same air. The head and neck should be uncovered,
while the lower part of the body should be carefully
covered, especially in those who are inclined to
insomnia, since cold feet tend to prevent sleep.

Position during Sleep. — It is desirable that we
should accustom ourselves to changes of position
during sleep. Dr. Osborne, who investigated the
most favourable position for sleep at various ages
of life, found that children under fourteen sleep
equally on the left side, the right side, and the back;
but that young girls and youths from fourteen to
twenty years of age sleep most often on the right
side (59 cases), then on the back (29), more rarely
on the left side (23).^ Similar observations on
soldiers have shown that they sleep more often on

^ Osborne, Dublin Quarterly Journal of Medical Science, i859>
vol. xxviii.

THE INFLUENCE OF TOSITION.

179

the right than on the left side. On the other hand,
Pettetan, Andral, and others have remarked that
inflammation of the right lung is more common than
is that of the left lung ; the predominance of the
former is as 2.5 to i ; or, according to Andral, as
2 to I. By many this fact is attributed to sleeping
on the right side, since, by the influence of gravity, a
passive stasis of blood and lymph thus occurs in the
right lung as well as in the liver. In the same way
we may explain the greater frequency of inflamma-
tion at the basis rather than at the apex of the lung
by the vertical ‘position during the day-time. The
vertical position also predisposes to other disturbances,
such as varicose veins, affections of the womb, haemor-
rhoids, etc. In order to avoid such injurious stases of
blood, some authors even recommend that during
the day we should vary the position of the body by
N reclining, lying down, etc., instead of always sitting
or standing. And if the uniform position of the
body is injurious even during waking life, it is much
more so during sleep, when there is already a tendency
to the formation of stasis and diminished tone of the
ti.ssues.

The influence of the position of the body on the
vasomotor sphere is shown by the change in the
pulse, which may fall from 85 in the standing position
to 76 when seated, and 68 when lying down; Mosso’s
balance also shows that during waking life there is a
more or less pronounced stasis of blood in the feet
and the lower part of the body, and that this
phenomenon is the more pronounced the more
anaemic and exhausted the tissues are. In feeble
and anaemic persons, whose vessel walls have lost
their normal tone, we may often observe pains in the

i8o

SLEEP.

back on awakening in the morning. These pains are
in many cases due to the habit of sleeping on the
back. The same habit may cause nightmare, for if
the stomach, when full of food, rests on the descending
aorta, there is an abnormal flow of blood to the brain
through the ascending aorta (Osborne).

My own observations lead me to believe that to
maintain the regular nutrition of all the tissues and
organs of the body it is important to change the
position of the body as often as possible during sleep,
and to take advantage of each awakening during the
night to sleep in turn on the right side, the left side,
and the back, while every morning, for at least half-
an-hour before rising, it is good to lie on the stomach.
At first this position may seem uncomfortable, but it
is not difficult to become so accustomed to it as even
to be able to sleep in this position. During the last
five or six years I have collected over twenty observa-
tions concerning the favourable effects of this position
in anaemic subjects who complained of severe pain in
the back. I have also several times had an oppor-
tunity of observing that this position, if taken every
day, exercises a salutary influence on angina pectoris;
the painful attacks of asthma and praecordial anguish
diminish and almost disappear. This beneficial
influence can only be explained by a more regular
distribution of blood and lymph, and consequently a
more normal nutrition of the cardiac muscle, as well
as by the dissipation of passive stases in the tissues
and organs of the back and sides. In little children
we may observe a marked tendency to sleep in this
position, flat on the belly, but they are broken of it,
evidently from the fear that they might acquire bad
habits. I have myself heard nursemaids frightening

THE EFFECTS OF INTERMITTENT SLEEP. l8l

children by saying that if they slept like that it would
do them harm, or be a sign that their father or mother
would die. It is therefore not surprising that we
have nearly all lost the habit of thus lying with the
face beneath, and that we are obliged to learn it
afresh, consciously. Animals are free from the
various disorders and diseases to which I have just
referred, and one cannot avoid asking how much such
disturbances of health are due to the proud erect posi-
tion which man alone among animals has adopted.

Thus position during sleep is by no means a matter
of indifference. On the contrary, to some extent health
depends upon it. With the exception of those who
suffer from undue flow of blood to the brain, and who
should have the head raised high on the pillow, we
should assume a nearly horizontal position, and be-
come accustomed from childhood to sleep by turns
on the right and left sides, the back, and the belly.

We have already, in dealing with insomnia, had
occasion to note the harmful results of brief, in-
terrupted periods of sleep. It may not be out of
place here to refer to the case of those who are
nursing the sick, and are specially liable to fall into
such habits of sleep. Every one who is watching an
invalid ought to be able to sleep for at least two or
three hours at a time, in order to pass the period of
deepest sleep and avoid any interruption of the
normal process of repair. It often happens that
those occupied in the care of persons who were
seriously ill have themselves fallen ill, evidently
because sleep was so broken and so short that the
brain was unable to obtain normal rest. It must be
remembered that sleep is accompanied by contraction
of the vessels of the brain, and repeated awakening at

i82

SLEEP.

the commencement of sleep must lead to dilatation
in place of contraction, and eventually to a serious
disturbance of vascular tone, since such useless alter-
nation of contraction and dilatation weakens the
vessel walls. A brief sleep is insufficient to nourish
the brain, and the dilatation of the vessels on awaken-
ing remains ineffective. Meynert’s investigations
have shown that mental diseases usually begin in
derangement of the vascular system; indeed, all the
different states of the organism, the functions of the
different organs, the contractions of the muscles, the
play of emotion and thought, depend necessarily on
the changes in the volume of the vessels, and in their
fulness; consequently any perturbation in the vaso-
motor system is shown in chemical and histological
modifications of the vessel walls, which, again, become
the point of departure of further more serious mis-
chief. So that even when we are forced to sleep very
little we should still reserve three or four hours of
continuous sleep.

The Hours of Rising mid Going to Bed. — The current
opinion has long been expressed in the proverb: Early
to bed and early to rise. This opinion, combined with
the wish of grown-up persons to arrange their evenings
as freely and quietly as possible, has led to the wide-
spread custom of sending children to bed at a very
early hour. It is evident that children who are sent
to bed at seven or eight o’clock in the evening ought
to get up at six or seven in the morning, and as the
parents, who went to bed much later, are then still
asleep, the children frequently have to begin life every
morning under the care of servants. This in itself is not
always a desirable circumstance, especially when we
remember that the servants themselves at this early

THE QUESTION OF EARLY RISING. 1 83

hour are often half asleep, unwashed, and dishevelled.
Moreover, during the winter months, it is still dark at
seven o’clock in the morning. No doubt it is well to
rise early, but only when we awake to meet the light
of day, not in the darkness of night, which, as we
have already seen, has an injurious influence on
metabolism. It seems desirable, therefore, that in
autumn and winter children should not be forced
to rise at an hour when the sun himself has not yet
risen; it would be better for them to go to bed at
nine or ten, so that they can get up when their rooms
are already lit up by daylight, or even by the rays of
the sun.

Equally injurious and unwholesome is the custom
of forcing school-children to get up by artificial light.
As a rule it would be better to conform more closely
to the conditions of nature, and to rise very early in
the spring and summer, late in the autumn and
winter. In southern countries, naturally, it is thus
possible to rise early even in the autumn and winter.
In this way northern peoples would sleep longer than
the inhabitants of southern countries, which is reason-
able, since a cold temperature increases the need for
sleep. I have found that when the temperature of
the room is from 66° to 68° Fahr. many people feel
perfectly refreshed after six to eight hours of sleep;
at 6o°-64° Fahr. the same persons slept eight or ten
hours; at 52°-56° Fahr. ten to twelve hours; while
when the temperature of the room was raised to
70°-76° Fahr. they could only sleep from three to five
hours. This relation between the surrounding tem-
perature and the duration of sleep — a relation which
is constant in subjects with a normal vascular system
—undergoes change in some old people who cannot

184

SLEEP.

sleep in rooms of which the temperature is below
70 or 74 Fahr. In such cases the vascular walls are
degenerated and less flexible and dilatable, so that a
highei temperature of the surrounding air is necessary
to enable the surface vessels to receive a larger
quantity of blood.

Returning to the question concerning the best hour
to rise, I may point out that those persons who get
up very early in the autumn or winter never look
fresh and cheerful, but, on the contrary, sour and
fatigued ; they give the impression that they have
not been refreshed by sleep, and that they have not
lisen of their own accord. Little children who get up
early in winter begin the day with tears and whines,
while in summer their awakening is accompanied by
joyous bursts of laughter. We have indeed all ex-
perienced the unpleasant feeling of rising in the dark
or when daylight is still struggling with darkness, and
the general experience of such sensations, together
with various theoretical considerations — in the unfor-
tunate absence of direct proof — may justify us in
concluding that it is good to rise early, but only
when the morning is light and sunny as in spring
and summer, and not when it is dark, damp, and
cold, as in autumn and winter. Light plays so
important a part in mental life that consciousness on
awaking from its periods of repose should be able to
expand in its brightness, and children and growing
young people should not be forced to begin every
day of their life, during autumn and winter, with a
series of painful or unpleasant sensations.

Such considerations are not trivial, for we do not
know what effects may follow causes even as slight as
these. Alexander von Humboldt pointed out that the

THE INFLUENCE OF LIGHT.

185

most insignificant circumstances, and even the sensa-
tions received by the different senses, may ultimately
modify the whole character, and change the direction
of life, if these influences fall on a young growing
organism.^ We know also that physical development
is quite different in southern countries, full of light
and sun, from what it is in the dark and frozen lands
of the far north (Rattray). Unfortunately detailed
investigations are still wanting, though the desir-
ability of observing the progress of different physio-
logical processes and different diseases in countries
of the extreme, north, where night lasts for several
months without interruption, has been pointed out by
various authors (Potain, etc.). It cannot be doubtful,
however, that while in autumn and winter it is good
to rise and to go to bed later, in spring and summer
we should rise early, at five or six in the morning,
when we can plunge into an ocean of light. We owe
everything to light; without it life is impossible; it
is light that we are searching for all our lives every-
where and in everything, and it is natural that we
should so act as to awaken every day in the midst of
light and not of darkness. It is unnecessary to add
that the habit of people in society of going to bed
when day is dawning and rising at mid-day, or even
later, is extremely hurtful. As a general rule it is
well to go to sleep at no later hour than eleven,
though the contemporary life of great cities is so
organised that it is often very difficult to carry out
this hygienic rule.

^ Fere has dealt with the subtle influence exerted by varying sensa-
tions on muscular movement; he found, however, that the dynamogenic
enfeeblement flue to darkness is less marked than might be supposed.
{Sensation et iMouvement, p. 47.)

SLEEP.

1 86

The bed should be exposed to the air and the sun-
light at all seasons of the year. T. his is obviously
desirable, since pillows and mattresses become im-
pregnated with the exhalations of the skin, which is
especially active during sleep. The bed itself should
neither be too soft nor too hard; the most hygienic
is the spring bed with hair mattress. Feather beds
should be abolished, except when it is specially
necessary to guarantee the sleeper against cold.

Many people have acquired the bad habit of
breathing through the mouth instead of through the
nose;i it is a highly injurious habit and predisposes
to affections of the throat as well as of the lungs;
moreover, it dries the mouth and pharynx, and during
sleep this sensation of dryness may bring on a fit of
coughing or other of those series of reflex pheno-
mena to which sleepers are specially exposed.

Starting and Distressed Awakening. — Dreams of
Flying. — In dealing with the hygiene of sleep we
cannot neglect two closely allied groups of pheno-
mena, the starting or “jumping” which always takes
place, when it occurs, on falling asleep, and the
distressed awakenings which occur in the early
morning. The latter are more distinctly morbid, so
that they do not much concern us here. They are
largely due to nervous exhaustion and to auto-intoxi-
cation by the products of digestion and metabolism;
and are common in neurotic subjects, in neura-
sthenia, epilepsy, and hysteria, as well as during
pregnancy and at the menopause, occurring chiefly in

^ Dr. Walters, by observation of 1007 persons at random in the
streets of London (and disregarding those persons whose mouths were
open in talking or for other adequate reason), found that not fewer
than 553, or nearly 55 per cent., had their mouth open. Med,

Journal^ 26th June 1897.)

DISTRESSED AWAKENINGS.

187

those who have reached middle age, and with about
equal frequency in men and women. The symptoms
can be largely relieved by those hygienic measures
already discussed, which stimulate and restore the
nervous energy (bright light, for instance, shortens
and decreases the acuteness of the attacks), and by
dietetic and other methods calculated to lead to the
excretion of waste products.^

The phenomenon of starting, or “jumping,” or

^ Dr. Macfarlane has specially studied this condition, and I may
quote some of his remarks:— “ The patients to whom I wish to refer
are a class of habitually bad sleepers, who awake every morning more
or less wearied and worn out, but who also from time to time, after an
unusually deep sleep, awake in great misery. Collectively, they present
very similar symptoms, although these may be modified to some extent
by temperament and mental development — in short, by the quality of
the man. They awake in the early morning, usually from four to five
o’clock, in much distress, covered with cold perspiration, and they lie
tortured by evil forebodings for an indefinite time. The mental distress
usually begins before sleep terminates ; they are conscious that it
awakens them, and occasionally they find themselves groaning. They
do not recollect that the sensation had its origin in a terrifying dream,
nor do they associate the awakening with dreaming. The acute misery
is followed by depression and dread. They attribute the awakenings to
sleeping ‘too deeply,’ and these bear an intimate relation to morbid
sleep. Two patients who are so afflicted state that they occasionally
awake not knowing who they are, or where they are, and without
know'ing that they have slept until they find out how many hours
have passed ; the mental unrest follows. They all agree that the
seizures, if they may be so called, are more prostrating than lying
awake all night. Such awakenings do not recur with regularity,
although in one instance they did so every seventh or eighth
night for a time. The patients who suffer in this way are invari-
ably neurotic and neurasthenic ; some are hypochondriacal. They
present widely different symptoms during the day, but they all exhibit,
in greater or less degree, a lack of mental power and endurance, and
they are introspective, self-conscious, and desponding. They dread the
unknown; frequently they are restless, and yawn and sigh a good deal.”
— A. W. Macfarlane, “Note on Distressing Awakenings,” Lancet^
nth April 1891.

i88

SLEEP.

psychic decapitation ” (froin its analogy to the
movements of beheaded animals), or “sensory shock”
(Weir MitchelP), occurs only on falling asleep, is
common in the young, and is a less distinctly morbid
condition. It always indicates, however, some slight
degree of nervous exhaustion ; it is the convulsive
and irregular action of the lower centres relieved
from cerebral control ; and in neurasthenic and
hysterical subjects, and in all those who are victims
of excess, as of tobacco, it is specially marked. It
is common, if not indeed normal, in children, and its
resemblance to the shock of sudden fear in presence
of danger, and the terror that it may consequently
arouse in a child’s mind, have suggested to Stanley
Hall that it is a factor in constituting the fear of
darkness.^

These startings on falling asleep, followed by sudden
awakening and sense of fear, are frequently associated
with the sensation of falling. It is not easy at present
to explain this association. It seems probably due
to the fact that, from lulling of consciousness, the
subject ceases to feel the contact of the bed, and
experiences the illusion that he is unsupported — that
is to say, that he is in the air — and thus he dreams
that he is falling. Added to this, we must bear in
mind that children have ample occasion to familiarise
themselves with the sensations of falls, and, as I have
pointed out, those startings and dreams of falling
or flying are specially common in children and the

^ Weir Mitchell, “Some Disorders of Sleep,” Am. Jour. Med. Sci.^
vol. «., pp. 120-123. These “sensory shocks,” however, include only
the sudden jars and explosions which occur within the head at this
time, more especially in cases of great nervous exhaustion.

* “A Study of Fears,” Am. Journ. Psych.., 1897, p. 188.

DREAMS OF FLYING, 1 89

adolescent of both sexes who are much inclined to
deep sleepd

This explanation is supported by the well-known
fact that at the moment of fainting the feeling of
slowly falling into space is frequently experienced.
At such a moment the nerves at the surface of the
body are more or less deadened by the enfeeblement
of consciousness. Under the influence of many nar-
cotics, also, such as opium, ether, and haschisch, the
sensibility of the cutaneous nerves and the muscular
sense is likewise deadened, and the subject imagines
himself to be flying or falling in the air, without
touching the floor. The sensations of falling and
flying experienced in dreams may thus be regarded

^ Professor Stanley Hall independently suggests a somewhat similar
origin for the dreams of falling or flying, especially invoking the actual
absence of the accustomed pressure felt on the soles of the feet and else-
where in the standing position or in the sitting position during waking
life. He also finds here a very ancient atavistic element: — “Our
animal ancestors were not birds, and we cannot inherit sensations of
flying, but they floated and swam for longer than they have had legs,
had a radically different mode of breathing, and why may there not be
vestigial traces of this in the soul, as there are of gill-slits under the skin
of our necks? And why may not the former come to as great prominence
in exceptional states and persons as the latter do in some monstrous
births? To deny it is to make the soul more limited in its backward
range than is the body. For one I am too idealistic, and cannot think
so meanly of the soul as to do this. Although it cannot be demonstrated
like rudimentary organs, I feel strongly that we have before us here
some of the oldest elements of psychic life, some faint reminiscent
atavistic echo from the primeval sea, not as primitive as the strange
geotropism of plants, but antedating perhaps limbs, and possibly even
visual factors of space perception. To me,” he adds, “ sensations of
hovering, gliding by an inner impulse rather than by limbs, falling and
rising, have been from boyhood very real both sleeping and waking,
and I may add with assured soundness of heart, lungs, and stomach,
although if caused by disease it would not hurt the argument.” — Study
of Fear, pp. 158, 159.

SLEEP.

190

as directly related to the deadening of the sensations
normally felt during sleep at the surface of the body.^
The Influence of Sleep in Disease. — We have seen
that the sleep produced by narcotic or hypnotic drugs
is not usually a normal sleep (p. 87), and that when
such drugs are prescribed in cases of insomnia it is
largely in order to break a bad habit or to prevent
its formation. They are, however, also useful in
another way, for the sleep they cause is often trans-
formed into normal sleep after the narcotic has been
eliminated from the blood and its influence dissipated.
This is a very desirable event, for in a number of
diseases sleep, as has often been shown, is the best of
medicines.

For this reason people who are seriously ill, when
once they have fallen into a normal sleep, should
never be awakened to take their medicine, for
medicine can never give what is given by normal
sleep and its processes of plastic nutrition. Every
doctor is glad to see the appearance of deep normal
sleep in patients who are seriously ill, for such sleep
is often decisive and marks the commencement of
convalescence.^

In this matter, however, as in others, the rule is
not without exceptions, and under some circum-
stances sleep may produce an injurious influence on
pathological processes. Thus in some cases of very

^ Sir William Gowers considers that there is some evidence to show
that the sensation of falling during sleep is caused by spontaneous con-
traction of the stapedius muscle in the ear. {Brit. Med. Jour., 14th
November 1896.)

^ Menander said that all diseases are curable by sleep, *'a broad
statement,” as the late Sir B. W. Richardson remarked, “ in which,
nevertheless, there may be something that is true, for good sleepers
are ever, as I think, the most curable patients.”

SLEEP IN DISEASE.

I9I

marked weakness of the heart it is possible for the
patient to sleep too long, regular administration of
cardiac tonics being essential, and on awaking such
patients must be lifted into the sitting posture
only with much precaution. Unfortunately, the
influence of sleep on various morbid states is at
present insufficiently explored ; there is no doubt
that it varies under varying pathological conditions.
We know, for instance, that sleep predisposes to
hsemorrhages (Becker) ; this is found to be the case,
for instance, in pulmonary tuberculosis, in piles, and
in uterine disorders, and is the result of more or
less dilatation of the vessels. Sleep also predisposes to
attacks of gout in those who have the gouty diathesis.
Profound and prolonged sleep is injurious to those who
are subject to convulsive disorders, such as epilepsy,
for, as we know, sleep abolishes consciousness and
temporarily transforms man into a reflex and spinal
animal, consequently exposing him to convulsive
attacks ; thus often in children and in some adults
there is spasmodic incontinence of the bladder during
sleep but not during the day. But, I repeat, these
questions are still insufficiently explored ; we do
not yet know how, and how much, the subjects of
various diseases ought to sleep.

Thus, to take an example, the phthisical suffer
greatly from excessive nocturnal sweats, and in
medical literature we may find many methods for
diminishing these sweats. But the very multiplicity
of the methods proposed shows that they do not
accomplish their aim. The tendency of consump-
tives to excessive and exhaustive sweats may easily
be understood when we realise that the accumulation
of carbonic acid in the organism must irritate the

192

SLEEP.

sweat centre and so provoke abundant perspiration.
We know that during sleep, even in normal subjects,
carbonic acid accumulates in the organism ; in the
phthisical this accumulation must be greater, for, as
Lauder Brunton points out, the respiratory centre
in these subjects is exhausted by much coughing, so
that the carbonic acid can no longer excite it to
greater activity.

Theoretical considerations, on the one hand, and
observation of patients on the other, lead to the
conclusion that those exhausting sweats of the
phthisical are less marked when the patients take
a light meal before going to bed; and this is natural,
since food causes the blood to flow towards the
stomach and diminishes the dilatation of the peri-
pheral vessels of the skin. I have observed, also,
that these exhausting sweats are completely absent,
or much diminished, when the patient sleeps during
the day-time and in the day-light. The light of a
lamp seems also to diminish the tendency, provided
it is not allowed to vitiate the air of the room. Pure
air is especially necessary for consumptives, as in
these the functional energy of the lungs is diminished
and the consequent defect of oxygenation must be
compensated by a larger amount of oxygen in each
respiration. The bedroom of the phthisical must be
cool and saturated with pure air.

Those who suffer from neuroses of the heart, or
other cardiac affections, need to remain in bed for
a considerable time — at least eight or ten hours — in
the horizontal position, every day, since the quiet of
bed and the horizontal position alone give the heart
repose and dispel the tendency to oedema of the feet
which is found in such cases. There is another

THE HOUR OF DEATH.

193

reason why these subjects should not rise too early ;
in the early morning hours, between four and eight
o’clock, they show a special tendency to cardiac
attacks. At this period there seems to be a special
state of cerebral anaemia and a general tendency
to depression. The distressed awakenings, already
spoken of, and the termination of many kinds of
morbid sleep occur at this hour. Between four
o’clock and eight also is the period of greatest
mortality; or, according to Watson and Finlayson,
the curve reaches its height between 5 and 6 A.M.
According to Schneider’s observations at Berlin, be-
tween 4 and 7 A.M.^ The results are recorded in the
following table : —

Proportion of Deaths per 1000.

Deaths.

A.M.

P.M.

12-4

)

4-8

8-12

(noon)

12-4

4-8

8-12

Watson and Finlayson .

13,854

159

180

174

162

166

159

Schneider

57,984

169

I91

169

152

163

157

^ Glasgoiu Medical Jourml, New Series, vol. vi., p. 171; Virchow’s
Archiv., Bd. xvi., p. 95; British Med. Journal, 26th Sept. 1896.
Beadles (^Brit. Med. Journal, 7th Nov. 1896), from the investigation
of the hour of death of nearly 3500 male and 1000 female inmates
^ of the Colney Hatch Lunatic Asylum, found that among the males
there was a very marked increase of deaths at from 5 to 7 A.M., but
no such increase among the females, who showed a more even curve
with a slight tendency to rise before noon, and again between 7 and
8 p. M. These asylum figures were probably recorded with accuracy.
It may be noted that the usual cause of death was exhaustion, and
that the average age of the females was much greater than that of the
males.

194

SLEEP.

Moreover, the observations of Monninghoff and
Peisbergen have shown that in healthy subjects,
while the culminating point of sleep is reached in
the last quarter of the second hour, it decreases in
depth up to four hours and a half ; there is then a
deepening of sleep, and at the end of five hours and
a half a second maximum of depth is reached, after
which there is progressive diminution until definite
awakening occurs. This second maximum of sleep
intensity, which seems connected with the appearance
of dawn, may often be observed empirically, especially
by those who have passed a restless night It seems
to be the time of maximum somnolence. Many years
ago, a famous physician. Dr. Graves, wrote: “It is
between three and five in the morning that the
inclination to sleep is strongest; it is about this
time that sentinels are most apt to slumber at their
posts, and consequently, attacks upon camps or
cities, made with the intention of effecting a surprise,
are usually undertaken at this period of the morning.”
Patrick and Gilbert, in their experiments on the effects
of abstinence from sleep (already referred to in
Chapter I.), found that the time of dawn is always
the period of greatest sleepiness.

While this is the normal course of sleep in healthy
subjects, in a man who was suffering from mitral in-
sufficiency of the heart the first maximum of sleep
appeared later; and, moreover, sleep became accen-
tuated three times instead of twice, and presented
more considerable variations than in the normal
subject.^ Unfortunately, these observations are still
unique; there is a pressing necessity to study not
only the sleep of normal persons, but also the various
1 Monninghoff and Peisbergen, Zeitsch ift fiir BioJogie, 1883.

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE.

195

changes in the character of sleep produced under the
influence of various chronic and acute diseases. It is
certain that sleep must be modified by disease, for
consciousness is so affected, and sleep is but the
resting-time of consciousness. We may find evidence
of this in the fact that sleep becomes irregular and .
restless in those who smoke more than usual, and
that alcohol modifies the character of the sleep. All
the influences which act upon consciousness must
necessarily be shared by sleep.

From various observations which I have lately
made, I believe that I am justified in concluding
that sleep decreases steadily at sunrise; and thus,
as every period of awakening is followed by deeper
sleep, it happens that we sleep very soundly during
the first hours of light, whence the well-known satis-
faction felt in such sleep. Mother Nature awakes
the whole organic world when each new day begins
to dawn, but if we remain deaf to her appeal and
endeavour by means of blinds and shutters to prolong
artificially the reign of nocturnal darkness and the
repose of unconscious life, then the general law — that
an incomplete awakening is followed by deeper
drowsiness — comes into action, and consciousness
falls gladly back into its part of the Sleeping Beauty
of the fairy-tale.

The Hypnagogic State. — Before concluding this
chapter it may be well to speak of the half-waking
or hypna.gogic state which occurs in some persons
at the moment when they awake, and for a few
seconds or even minutes prevents them from gaining
full consciousness, or from understanding where they
are or what they have to do. Such a state, if prolonged,
always indicates a certain feebleness and inertia of

SLBJiP.

196

consciousness and its anatomical substratum, and
consequently it is not of good augury. Cases may
be found in medical literature (Schnittmiiller, Brierre
de Boismont) in which this half-waking state preceded
the development of mental disease, of which it was, so
to speak, the precursor. This is not surprising, for
when the nervous balance is ill-established the most
insignificant cause may provoke a dissolution in the
grouping of cerebro-nervous elements. Thus there
are cases (Dickson) in which, after only once being
put under the influence of chloroform, a state of
complete dementia has supervened.

It is unnecessary to add that since the prolongation
of the half-waking state indicates peculiar weakness of
consciousness, it is not found in persons whose con-
scious cerebral activity is highly developed, or, if it
is found, it is not a good symptom.’- From obser-
vations which I have collected, it appears that among
100 cases of this state, 8 were found among subjects
occupied in severe intellectual work, 70 in people
whose work involved much exercise of the arms
and feet, and 22 in people occupied as merchants,
artists, officials, etc. It may be added that the half-
waking state occurs especially in stout, phlegmatic,
and plethoric individuals, and very rarely in nervous
and sanguine persons.

This state of half-awakening has been studied by
Baillarger and Maury, and they called it “the
intermediate state between sleeping and waking,
or the hypnagogic state.” They acknowledged a

1 It has lately been suggested that there is a connection between the
hypnagogic state and that disturbance of memory, often associated
with exhaustion, commonly called paramnesia. (H. Ellis, “A Note on
Hypnagogic Paramnesia, ” .d/iW, April 1897,)

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE,

197

certain relation between this state of half-awakening
and different states of mental aberration, which can-
not astonish us, as we have seen already that
intellectual pursuits lessen the frequency of this
peculiar state ; and on the other side we have seen
that this state of half-awakening denotes always a
weakened state of consciousness. It is therefore of
interest to find out what physical and physiological
peculiarities underlie it. As we know already, normal
sleep is always accompanied by a temporary anaemia
of the brain, consequent on an enforced flow of the
blood from the head to the skin and other organs
of our body; it is only natural to suppose that this
state of half-awakening is observed only in cases
when the vasomotor system shows an exceptional
feebleness of tonus ; that is, when the blood-vessels,
after being contracted during sleep, cannot dilate
quickly enough at the moment of an awakening
that comes much too early and too abruptly. In
consequence of this slowness of dilatation, the blood-
vessels of the awakened person remain during a
certain time contracted and the brain more or less
anaemic. And so it comes to pass that the awakened
person continues to remain in a state of half-sleep,
of half-consciousness, during which he sees, hears
and perceives everything; but cannot give an account
of all this, cannot, in short, form a judgment of
anything. In other words, a person in this state of
half-awakening perceives everything in the pheno-
menal world around us by the laws of space and of
time ; but, at the same time, the law of causality,
or of the sufficient cause (Schopenhauer), remains in
a state of nearly complete inactivity, and conscious-
ness itself is found to be more or less absolutely inert.

198

SLEEP.

All the cases of half-awakening which I have had
occasion to observe were as a rule developed only
when a person was awakened after a few hours of
sleep. It was only in five cases that I was able to
see this state of half-awakening in the morning after
a good sleep of eight or ten hours. This makes our
supposition about the role of the tonicity of blood-
vessels in the appearance or non-appearance of half-
awakening only the more probable. Everybody will
agree that a sleep of from six to eight hours is sufficient
even for a vascular system of marked inertia, because
it gives the blood-vessels time to gather up such a
quantity of energy that in the morning they can
dilate with sufficient rapidity, and consequently
the peculiar state of half-awakening is not found.
In cases where this state of half-awakening is observed
even after a sufficiently long sleep, it is always a
sure sign of a pathological change taking place in
the vascular system. And indeed in medical litera-
ture there exist descriptions of many cases in which
the state of half-awakening was found to be excep-
tionally long, and in all these cases formed the first
precursory phenomena of a coming mental disease.
Such cases have been described by Schnittmiiller and
Brierre de Boismont, as I have already mentioned.

We cannot be surprised that the state of half-
awakening is dependent on the condition of the
vascular system, because we know that the late
Professor Meynert has already demonstrated the
predominating significance of the vascular system
in the development of different mental diseases.
From another side. Dr. Anjel has experimentally
proved that the blood-vessels of persons suffering
from neurasthenia lose their capacity to react by

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE.

199

dilatation or by contraction in answer to certain
irritations; and, at the same time, it has been observed
that the blood-vessels of neurasthenic persons do not
show the well-known play of successive dilatations
and contractions, by which the equilibrium between the
opposite states of the vascular system is maintained.
The importance of the vascular system for the mode
of life of our organism is so great, that in his clinical
lectures Professor Peter used to say the age of man is
determined not so much by the number of years he
has lived, as by the condition of his blood-vessels.
If we reflect on his proposition; “On a 1 age de
ses vaisseaux,” we shall necessarily arrive at the
conclusion that our health must also directly de-
pend on the condition of our vessels, because if once
we admit that our age is thus dependent on the state
of our blood-vessels, so must be also our health; and
so we arrive at the conclusion which Meynert tried to
demonstrate.

After all that has been said here, it is easy to
conceive that the state of half-awakening can be
considered as normal only in those cases in which it
appears after too short a sleep, and one which has
been interrupted by force; or, in other words, this state
of half-awakening can be considered as normal only in
those cases in which the sleeping person has not had
the necessary time for rest and tor the restitution
of the losses which his body has sustained before
going to sleep.

When 1 was making my observations on this state
of half-awakening, I remembered that in my youth I
had heard something about the liability of such sub-
jects to fright and to other emotions of the depressive
type, and that I had been told of a youth of fifteen

200

SLEEP,

who, on awaking, showed all signs of going to sleep
again, when his sisters, annoyed by his sleepiness,
pretended to ery, and told him that their elder sister
(who acted as a mother to the family) had died

Av- they awoke him because of that.

ithout a word the youth began to sob so desperately
that he in his turn frightened his sisters, who, in order
to soothe him, in vain told him it was a joke.
1 hey called in their elder sister, but their^rother was
beyond consolation, and although his sister was* before
him, could not understand that she was alive. Finally
e fell into a fit of convulsions. The doctor was
called in, and he at last succeeded in quieting the
youth, who, nevertheless, suffered for some days.

The remembrance of this case gave me the idea to
try if it is indeed so easy to make suggestions to persons
in the state of half-awakening, and, at the same time, it
showed me the necessity of prudence in experiments
of this kind. The observations and experiences that
I have made in this respect have proved to me that
all ideas and emotions of a depressive character
can be suggested much more easily than ideas or
emotions of an exciting type; because, for example,
the suggestion of anger or of joy occasioned mostly
the complete arousing of the subject experimented
upon in the state of half-awakening. This influence of
anger and of joy is easy to understand, for emotions
of such a type are always accompanied by a flow of
blood towards the brain, and as sleep itself is possible
only when the brain is containing less blood than in
ordinary conditions, it is only natural that a com-
parative hyperaemia of the brain wakes up the sleeper,
and also that it interrupts the peculiar state of half-
awakening. It must not be forgotten that the famous

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE.

201

physiologist, Burdach, had already made the observa-
tion on himself that joyful dreams wake up the sleeper
much more often than dreams of an opposite type.

The very fact that all exciting emotions have
the power to interrupt the state of half-awakening
serves as an indirect proof of the truth of the
supposition that the half-awakening depends on the
want of tonicity in the blood-vessels of the brain,
in consequence of which they do not dilate quickly
enough to awake the sleeper completely.

After having convinced myself of the possibility of
employing the state of half-awakening for the sugges-
tion of emotions, principally of the depressive type, I
was naturally led to experiment if it was possible to
make intellectual suggestions to persons who remain
for some time in this peculiar state of half-awakening.
The experiences consisted in suggesting to the half-
awake person some illogical and absurd answer to a
given question. In all such cases I observed one of
two things, that is, the person experimented upon
is either suggested and begins to repeat auto-
matically the false answer, or the state of half-
awakening is interrupted, and the person, now quite
awake, gives a reasonable answer.

In my study of this peculiar state of half-awakening
I had in view not only the relations of this state to
sleep and dreams, but also the extent and the
variations of suggestibility in different persons. I
have already mentioned that I made one hundred
observations on half-awakening in grown-up people.
The age of these persons varied between fifteen
and seventy years. Besides these observations, I
have also made some experiments on children from
three to fourteen years of age. These children

202

SLEEP.

paitly belonged to the educated classes and partly
to the lower classes of society.

There are many persons who present this state
when they are awakened in the middle of a pro-
found sleep, but only for a very short time. When
such subjects are thus waked up they do not at
once regain their usual consciousness; they appear
to be confused and not know where they really
are and what is wanted of them; but this state
lasts only for a few moments. Experience soon
showed me that one cannot use cases of half-
awakening for experiments of any kind, save
perhaps for suggestions of fear, when they present
a duration of less than fifteen seconds. And even
the suggestions of fear are very far from being always
successful in those cases, because persons in whom
the state of half-awakening is very short-lived are not
easily brought under suggestions even of emotional
kind, so that when you shout at them, “We are
burning, ’ or “ House on fire,” instead of getting
frightened at once in a reflex manner, they wake up
instantly and completely, and with the air of a con-
scious observer ask, “ Where is the fire ? ” and “ What
is burning ? ” Even in cases when one is successful
enough to suggest the emotion of fear to these per-
sons with a short-lived state of half-awakening, it
lasts too short a time. This made me decide to
count as cases of half-awakening only those in which
this state has a duration of more than fifteen seconds.
My observations showed me that this state of half-
awakening can last from fifteen seconds to six
minutes; in some cases the half-awakening lasted
even more than six minutes, but cases of this
kind are to be considered as wholly abnormal, and

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE. 203

they must inspire us with anxious doubts as to the
mental health of persons presenting such unusually

long periods of half-awakening.

As I have already said, my suggestions to persons
in the half-awakened state consisted first of all of
different emotions ; principally I used to suggest
emotions of fear and of anxiety, and sometimes also
of sorrow; then in the second place I tried to suggest
to them false judgments and opinions. The intel-
lectual suggestions were always made in such a
fashion that my questions contained the false
answer which I wished to suggest. So, for example,

I asked: “Tell me, does not three times two make
five?” or “Do not you know that it has been snow-
in£j this summer?” or “What must we do to light
a dark room? blow out tlie lamps?

In cases where the state of half-awakening is very
deep, each question that one asks the half-awake
person calls forth the phenomenon of “echo” —
that is to say, the subjects who are plunged in the
half-awakened state begin to repeat mechanically
the two last, or even only the last word of the
question. It is almost needless to mention that in
such cases of profound half-awakening there can be
no question of suggestion.

In my observations I counted the intellectual sug-
gestion as successful only in those cases when the
persons plunged in the half-awakened state gave me
suggested false answers with a certain conviction and
a certain insistance, saying, for example, “Certainly
three times two make five,” etc. A mechanical and
automatical repetition of words used in my question
was considered by me as a direct proof of the in-
capacity of the person experimented upon to take in

204

SLEEP.

intellectual suggestions; in such cases I tried next

to suggest an emotion of some kind or other, and in
this I was mostly successful.

The duration of half-awakening was much more
considerable in children, and especially in children

onging to the working classes; in .them the
half-awakenmg lasted often from five to si.x
minutes Of the persons whom I observed in

IS state nearly a third were Finlanders (of 84
persons 27 were from Finland), and as all of them
piesented a very marked and a very long state of
half-awakening, I cannot look on this as a pure
accident but I think that we have here a national
peculiarity. ^ Perhaps this liability to the state of
half-awakening is explained by the fact that amongst
the natives of Finland it is nearly impossible to find
a person of sanguine temperament.

As has been mentioned above, the state of half-
awakening is met far more often amongst people
ivmg by the work of their muscles, and, to judge
by my observations, intellectual pursuits must
be very unfavourable to the development of half-
awakening. But the difference does not end here •
to my surprise I have remarked that men and
women belonging to the same class of society, and
consequently possessing more or less the same
intellectual^ development, present nevertheless a
marked difference in their liability to the half-
awakening state. And what astonished me still
more was that this difference was wholly to 'the
advantage of women, as it appeared that they
have much less liability to fall into this state of
half-awakening than the men of a corresponding
position in life. So, for example,v in experimenting

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE.

205

on 30 women I met with 60 cases of half-awakening,
and at the same time 13 men have presented this
half-awakening 40 times. This difference cannot be
explained by a predominance of intellectuality ; I
think that we must search for an explanation in
those qualities of women which make it so easy for
them to hear every cry and even every slight move-
ment of their children, and that notwithstanding
that they are fast asleep. The same qualities make
women excellent sick-nurses. This difference between
the sexes does not depend upon different occupations,
but most probably it takes its source in variations
of the organisation, because it shows itself even in
children, and that from the first years of life, when
no kind of occupation could have had any influence.

It is necessary to remark here that for my experi-
ments and observations I took only those subjects
who presented more or less easily the state of half-
awakening, and on every such subject I made ten
separate experiments — that is to say, each subject
has been ten times waked up from the most pro-
found sleep. To be sure that the sleep in every case
was interrupted at its most profound degree, I strictly
observed the rule that the sleeper should be awakened
only after two and .a half or three hours of quiet
sleep. It is to be understood that each observation
was repeated only after an interval of some days.
Persons who presented only a very short-lived half-
awakening, as well as those who did not present it at
all, were excluded from these experiments; but before
deciding this question it was necessary to make two
or three experiments with every person. As far as I can
judge by my observations, made at long intervals in
the course of several years, children present this state of

2o6

SLEEP.

half-awakening very often in comparison with grown-
up people. Among grown-up people I have found
the half-awakening state in one out of every ten
observed subjects ; but if taken in separate groups,
the working men and women, and the subjects with
intellectual or commercial or artistic pursuits, gave a
maiked difference, so that in the working men and
women group one person presented the half-awakening
out of every four observed persons. In the group
consisting of merchants, artists, military men, and
so on, there were 2 such subjects to every 25
persons, and in the intellectual group only r to
every 50 persons. Among children the liability to
fall into a half-awakened state was more marked
the younger they were, so that in those whose age
was between three and six or seven years of age, the
half-awakening was met in 8 out of every 10 subjects,
and in children between seven and fifteen years of
age this proportion sank to 4 out of every 10
subjects. I am certain that if one could make

these observations on a larger scale, taking note
of every detail of age, development, occupation, sex,
nationality, and hereditary predisposition to diseases,
etc., one would get results that would throw much
light on many questions of physiology and psycholog}^
But for such observations the co-operative work of
many persons would be needed. This work of mine
was carried on from 1890 to 1895.

When the persons liable to half-awakening have
been found, it is necessary to take account not only
of the successful experiments, but also of the un-
successful ones, because there are, individually, con-
siderable differences in degree, frequency, depth of
state, etc. The differences that are seen in this

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE. 20/

direction present also a certain relation to age, to
sex, to intellectual development, and so on. So, for
example, I had under observation eight children, from
three to six years of age, belonging to the lower social
classes. Four of them were girls, and out of 40
experiments they presented the half-awakening 25
times, while the four boys presented it 35 times.
Of children belonging to the educated class, and
between the age of three to six years, I had under
observation only five subjects ; three of them were
girls, and out of 30 experiments they presented the
half-awakening 15 times, while the two boys pre-
sented it 17 times out of 20.

With my latest experiments, I have had in all
under observation 16 children between the age of
seven and fifteen years — 6 boys and 10 girls. The
boys have presented the half-awakening 29 times out
of 60 experiments, while the 10 girls showed it 34
times out of 100 experiments. Among the 6 boys
there were 4 belonging to the lower classes, and out
of 40 experiments they showed the half-awakening
25 times; among the 10 girls there were 7 be-
longing to the working classes, and they presented
the half-awakening 28 times out of 70 experiments,
while the remaining three girls of the educated
classes presented the half-awakening 6 times out
of 30 experiments.

The age of 25 to 40 years seems to be the most
unfavourable for the development of half-awakening;
after 40 years, and particularly after 50 years, the
state of half-awakening begins again to show itself
more often, and I think that the chief cause of this
fact is to be looked for in those pathological changes
that are so often observed at this time of life

208

SLEEP.

in the walls of the blood-vessels. I cannot give here
the exact numbers of persons showing a liability to
half-awakening at different ages. But, at all events,
I have noted the fact that the age between 25
to 40 years of life has given me the smallest
number of -cases of half-awakening ; and we arrive
at the same conclusion when we make a com-
parison between the numbers of repetition of the state
of half-awakening in persons of different age. So,
for example, ly persons were between 15 to 24
years ; they showed the half-awakening 41 times
(each of them was subjected to the experience, as
always in these observations, 10 times); 24 persons
of the age between 25 to 40 years of life presented
the half-awakening in 23 cases (out of 240 ex-
periments), while 14 subjects between 41 to 70 years
of age have shown the half-awakening 36 times.

In judging the predominance of half-awakening in
the group of persons from 15 to 24 years of age we
must not forget that there were young girls in this
group, and my observations have shown me that
women of this age present mostly a more marked
predisposition to the half-awakening than men of the
same age or than women of more advanced a^e. For
a just appreciation of this result it must be remarked
that among the women of this group (15 to 24)
there were some girls still below puberty and
who presented at the same time marked signs of
anaemia. After what I have observed I am convinced
that anaemia forms a weighty predisposing cause in
the development of the half-awakening state.

Intellectual suggestions, that is suggestions of
different false ideas, various false and absurd repre-
sentations, have shown in the most decided manner

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE.

209

that children have a most marked predisposition for
suggestions of this kind, and that this predisposition
shows itself the more strongly the younger the
children are. So it was that among 55 persons
of over 15 years of age the intellectual suggestions
were successful only in 25 per cent, of all the cases
in which such suggestions were tried, while emotive
suggestions were successful in 45 per cent. On the
contrary, children under 15 years of age showed
successful intellectual suggestions in 85 per cent.,
while emotive suggestions were with them nearly
always successful ; at least, in my experiments they
were successful in 97 per cent.

A special interest attaches to cases in which the
persons undergoing suggestions during the half-
awakening state do not wake up completely, but
after lemaining some time in the half-conscious
state are again plunged in a profound sleep as
soon as the experiment is finished. In these cases
it happened sometimes that persons experimented
upon told us, after getting up in the morning, of
all we had been suggesting to them in their state
of half-awakening; but they told of it as of a
dream that they had had in the night. In other
words, in cases when the half- awakening passed
directly into a profound sleep, the persons experi-
mented upon never remembered the fact that they
had been waked up during the night, and their
memory retained the contents of the suggestion only
in the form of a dream that they supposed they
had dreamed during the night. Cases of this kind I
have met with only rarely, and the apparent reason of
it must be looked for in the fact that the half-awaken-
ing is only in very few cases deep enough to pass with-

210

SLEEP.

out interruption — that is without a complete waking up
— into a profound sleep directly after the experiment
is finished. Besides this, the remembrance of the
received suggestion was not always retained by the
memory of the person passing uninterruptedly from
half-awakening into a sleep consecutive to the experi-
ment; very often such persons on waking up in
the morning did not remember anything, and were
strongly convinced that they had slept the whole
night in a profound sleep without any trace of a
dream whatever.

Altogether I have met with 35 cases in which the
half-awakening passed directly into a sound sleep;
but in 10 of these cases the subjects did not remember
anything on getting up in the morning. In the re-
maining 25 cases a simple remembrance of the
• suggested idea or emotion has been observed in 17
cases (68 per cent.), and in all these 17 cases the
persons experimented upon were strongly convinced
that they had been dreaming about snowing during
a hot summer’s day, or about a house being on fire,
and so on.

In all such cases the recollection that remained. of
the suggestion contained always an emotive element;
so, for example, these persons remembered mostly
the emotions of fright, of anxiety, of sorrow, that
were suggested to them, and even when they remem-
bered an intellectual suggestion they remembered it
always on the emotive side— that is, they remembered
it only because it had evoked in their half-conscious
soul the emotion of wonder ; as it was, for example,
with the suggested idea of snow during a summer’s
day.

In some cases the subjects on getting up in the

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE.

2II

morning began not only to speak about the suggested
idea, but they surrounded this idea with details
which were quite foreign to the suggestion made by
me; so, for example, they spoke about the landscape
in which they saw the snow falling on a warm
summer’s day, and they added some other details
that were not included by me in the suggestion.
Cases of this kind can be explained only by the
supposition that the suggested idea has served as a
theme on which the dreams had been spinning their
fantastic creations, so that around a simple suggested
idea there has been formed different pictures more or
less complicated.

Considering that suggestions made during the half-
awakening can leave on the cerebral system such a
strong trace that the subjects remember them even
after a sound sleep of many hours, or that they employ
them as canvas for their different dreams, which in
their turn reinforce still further the traces left by
suggestion, considering all this, we come to the
conclusion that thoughts, wishes, and sentiments
suggested amidst certain conditions can in fact
sometimes leave traces so strong that they do not
disappear wholly, but even influence the real life
of the subject in a more or less marked way. The
truth of this supposition is supported by many
occurrences in everyday life, as when we are during
many hours sorrowful or glad solely in consequence
of some silly dream that we had in the night. I
remember having read about a worthy old German
professor who had dreamt one night of being
again a child and of being subjected to a thorough
thrashing. Getting up in the morning the old pro-
fessor felt himself quite out of sorts, and the whole

212

SLEEP.

day lie vainly tried to restore his ordinary good
humour ; the remembrance of the thrashing of
which lie had been dreaming had robbed him of
his ordinary peaceful and joyful disposition, although
he enjoyed perfect health. In the following chapter
we shall have to return to the consideration of this
subject.

In such cases as these we have an example of an
involuntary and accidental self-suggestion of different
emotive states, and it would be very interesting to
find out and to define exactly the conditions which
make us so impressionable to suggestions that can
even be made by our dreams. As far as I could
remark, in the course of my observations, suggestions
of this kind, that is, suggestions produced by dreams
and showing their influence in the real life of men,
are to be seen only when there are present unmis-
takable signs of cerebral overwork, which unhappily
is very often met with nowadays. ■

In persons who presented a long and profound
half-awakening I remarked nearly always a marked
predisposition to a cataleptic condition of different
muscular groups; it was comparatively easy to bring
the extremities of such a person into any position with-
out waking up the subject experimented upon, and
then the limbs remained in these often very tiresome
positions for a more or less long time, and it hap-
pened sometimes that they remained in such positions ^
the whole time of the half-awakening. Even in cases
when no attempt was made to place the extremities
in other positions, they showed of themselves a v
cataleptic condition, and were sometimes fixed by it
in the most unnatural positions. In cases where the
half-awakening was very deep it happened sometimes

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE.

213

that the person under observation was standing or
walking in the room, but all this with the air of
an unconscious automaton. The best means to
arouse a person from the half-awakening I found
to be simple blowing in his face, or throwing on to
it some drops of cold water. These simple means
acted more energetically than calling or even shaking
the person, and the like rough manipulations. The
same result of blowing into the face or of throwing
drops of cold water is observed, as every one knows,
in cases of hypnotic sleep, and after all I have seen in
relation to the half-awakening I am led to consider
it as a natural hypnotic state, while the so-called
hypnotic state presents, in my opinion, nothing more
than a half-awakening produced by artificial means.
I have already expounded' this view in my lectures of
1894, and now, after a series of experiments, I am
still more convinced of the complete analogy of the
hypnagogic and the hypnotic state.

The fact that the half-awakening can be in the
easiest and the most effective way interrupted by
simply blowing into the face, while rougher
manipulations remain without effect, is in a high
degree interesting, because it proves the correctness
of our supposition about the vasomotor foundation
of the half-awakening. In 1882 I proved by a series
of experiments, which were afterwards confirmed
by Dr. Istomanoff and other experimenters, that
the smallest irritations of the skin of the face by
tickling, such as the lightest touch of a feather or
blowing, are sufficient to occasion the most marked
effects in the vasomotor system, calling forth a
dilatation of the brain vessels and a corresponding
contraction of the skin vessels of the arm and ex-

214

SLEEP.

tiemities in general. And now we see that blowing
into the face is most effective in interrupting the half-
awakening, which, as we may suppose, depends on
an insufficient dilatation of the brain vessels of the
untimely awakened sleeper. The tickling of the
face by a feather I have also tried in some few
cases, and it proved as effective as blowing into
the face.

Further analogy between the half-awakening and
the hypnotic state is seen in the fact that by fre-
quent repetition the liability to half-awakening is
strengthened, and a kind of habit is as easily formed
as for the hypnotic sleep. This makes strict careful-
ness and prudence the more necessary in every kind
of experiment with the half-awakening.

The pulse during the half-awakening showed always
an evident tendency to become lower; so, for example,
three persons of the age of i6, 1 8, and 2 1 years, present-
ing ordinarily a pulse of go, 85, and 92 beats in the
minute, showed during the half-awakening only 60,
70, and 56 strokes; and subjects of 35 and 55 years,
having ordinarily a pulse of 70 and 60 beats, pre-
sented during half-awakening 54 and 49 beats of
the pulse. But it must be remarked that this pulse
rate was not constant; on the contrary, it changed
more or less, and these changes were especially
marked during successful emotional suggestions. So
every time when the emotion of fright was suggested
I have remarked first a slowing of the pulse, that
sometimes amounted to a momentary pause, and then
there developed a more or less distinct acceleration.
In all ca.ses in which this acceleration was very marked
(20 and more beats) it was followed by an immediate
awakening of the observed person.

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE.

215

The respiration, as far as I could remark, was in
half-awakening very irregular, showing accelerations
and pauses; but if the subjects were left alone their
respiration very soon subsided. Before leaving the
physical side of this state I must mention that the
face of half-awakened persons had always a some-
what tumefied look, which was most strongly
marked in the region of the eyelids.

My observations on suggestion during the hypna-
gogic state have shown me, in the most unmistak-
able manner, that, ccsteris paribus, emotions are far
more easily suggested than any ideas or judgments
and conclusions. This -cannot astonish us, because
the same observations have shown that the state
appears the more easily as the intellectual develop-
ment of the observed person is comparatively low,
and lasts the longer as the person observed has the
more feeble capacity for judgment. It follows, con-
sequently, that a strong intelligence, a powerful
capacity for judgment in a person, make him in-
accessible to suggestions, and at the time also make
him incapable of the half-awakening. Once we know
all this, we can understand that intellectual sugges-
tions cannot be so easily made as the emotive ones,
because every intellectual suggestion must necessaril)^
call forth the function of judgment, and once it is called
forth it must necessarily interrupt the half-awakening
and make every suggestion impossible.

Turning from the psychical side to the physical
side, the most important condition for the develop-
ment of half-awakening and of suggestibility we have
found to be different anomalies of the vascular system,
and especially a want of tonus in the walls of the
blood-vessels, and their consequent inertness.

2i6

SLEEP.

s as been mentioned before, children are most
predisposed to the half-awakening and to sugges-
tions, and it may well be asked how this fact is to
be explained, as the vascular system of children
could not be considered to be naturally subjected to
pathological changes of different kinds. Certainly,
if any have the right to possess healthy blood-
vessels, they must be our children. All this is quite
true; but then it must not be forgotten that, as the
judgment and all the intellectual forces of children
are in an undeveloped condition, so are also their
blood-vessels.

In this respect Professor Beneke has made highly
interesting observations and measurements, which
have, for example, proved that the volume of the
heart enlarges during the years of infancy, of child-
hood, and of first youth, to twelve times its first size,
because in the newly-born baby it is equal to about
20-25 cub. cent, and in an adult man the volume of
the heart is already equal to 260-310 cub. cent. The
circumference of the ascending aorta gets three and a
half times larger as the child grows up to be an
adult man or woman, and the same process of
enlargement is going on also with the ciixumferences
of the thoi'acic aorta, of the abdominal aorta, with
the circumferences of the iliac artery, of the sub-
clavian artery, of the carotid, etc. It has been shown
also that the respective relations of the different
blood-vessels to one another are also changing as the
child grows up ; so, for example, the pulmonary is
broader by nearly five millimetres than the ascending
aorta in the child, while in a grown-up person both
these vessels are equal, or the pulmonary becomes
even somewhat narrower than the aorta. It is also

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE.

217

to be remembered that in proportion as the body
is growing, the different blood-vessels, together with
the lymphatic ducts, are also getting longer, and
all this must necessarily change more or less, not
only the respective relations of the blood-vessels
one to the other, but also the condition of their
walls.

After all that has been said, it is easy to under-
stand why children present very pronounced half-
awakenings and a considerable liability to sugges-
tion, and that, notwithstanding, a healthy condition
of the heart and blood-vessels. In children the heart
and the blood-vessels are, so to say, in an unfinished
state, and not capable of passing from one condition
into another as quickly and as thoroughly as in
healthy grown-up people,'and consequently the cere-
bral blood-vessels, when narrowed under the influence
of the contraction occasioned by sleep, cannot dilate
at once when the child is awakened in the middle
of a sound sleep ; in remaining for some time
contracted the cerebral blood-vessels realise the
anatomico-physiological conditions for the develop-
ment of half-awakening. On the psychical side,
moreover, we find in children a more or less marked
weakness of judgment, of consciousness and intellect
in general, and so children are very prone to every
kind of suggestion, not only during the half-awakening
state, but also in their everyday life. The suggesti-
bility of children is shown very often in their play,

and IS wrongly taken for a sign of a lively imagina-
tion.

Before leaving the question of half-awakening I
must mention that in ten subjects, from seven to
seventeen years of age, I have tried to weaken the

2i8

SLEEP.

predisposition to half-awakening-, and to produce, if
possible, progressively, a complete destruction of this
predisposition. With this end in view I awakened
the subjects chosen for these experiments at different
hours of the night and of the morning, and noting
the signs of half-awakening, I continued to use every
means of waking them till I aroused them com-
pletely. The disposition to half-awakening became
weaker and weaker, and at last, in some cases, it
disappeared completely, but only in some cases ; in
others it persisted though in a less degree.

These experiments illustrate very well the import-
ance of exercise even in this direction, and when a
marked disposition to half-awakening is observed it
would be well to counteract this disposition by
systematic unexpected awakening at different hours
of the night and morning. As I have said, women
show less disposition to half-awakening than men,
and it is more than probable that their comparative
freedom has been attained thanks to their children,
as they have thus been obliged to exercise themselves
in waking up at different hours of the night and
morning. It would be certainly interesting to make
observations on soldiers and sailors, who are so often
obliged to be on duty in the hours of the night,
and to compare the percentage of half-awakening
in them with the percentage of such cases in simple
labourers, peasants, farmers, etc. I think that there
would be found a considerable difference. Personally
I had no opportunity of making these comparative
observations, but I tried to replace them by experi-
ments on midwives, and I certainly obtained the
conviction that among midwives it is more difficult
to find cases of half-awakening than among dress-

THE HYPNAGOGIC STATE. 2ig

makers, servants, or even governesses and women
with intellectual pursuits.

In the course of these experiments I remarked
further that a cool bedroom lessens the predisposition
to half-awakening, while too warm a temperature in
the bedroom increases it and at the same time makes
the half-awakening itself more profound. In general
too warm a bedroom (68° to 73° ^-) ^ influ-

ence not only on persons disposed to half-awakening,
but in general on all those whose tissues have
an enfeebled tonicity and whose respiratory ex-
change is not active enough. I have made some
experiments by putting a bag filled with cold water
to the head of those sleeping persons whose dis-
position to half-awakening was already known to me,
and in those cases I have always observed that the
half-awakening was either considerably shortened and
weakened or altogether dispersed.

Before concluding I may mention here the follow-
ing observation accidentally made: two girls, of the
ages of seven and eight and a half years, sisters, and
both remarkably predisposed to the half-awakening,
lived with their mother, a washerwoman in a gentle-
man’s house. As they were left to their own devices
all day, the lady of the house found it necessary to
place them in a school as day-scholars ; school-life
agreed well with both the girls, and in a short time
they were among the best of their class. Under
the influence of school-life and occupation the dis-
position to half-awakening was more and more^
weakened, and a year after their entrance into the
school disappeared altogether and did not reappear
until the years of puberty, when both of them began
again to show a very decided predisposition to the

2 20

SLEEP.

half-awakening. At the same time both the sisters
began to show marked signs of chlorosis.

After all that has been said about the hypnagogic
state and the means to combat it, every one, I think, will
agree with me that it is desirable from time to time
to change the hours of getting up, as well as the
hours of going to sleep, because by this one gets
accustomed quickly and at any hour of sleep to
regain his full consciousness. Going to sleep at a
certain hour very soon becomes a habit, and sleepi-
ness comes on at the accustomed time; the same is
to be remarked in reference to getting up. My
observations of children showed me that those of
them who through childhood are made to observe
strictly regular hours in going to sleep and in getting
up are more prone to fall into the half-awakening
state on being aroused at an unusual hour than
others not accustomed to such absolute regularity.
In my dealings with children I have found it very
useful to change the hour of their going to sleep and
getting up at different seasons of the year, so that in
spring and in summer they were made to get up
much earlier than in autumn and in winter. From
time to time in summer it is good to arrange
some pleasure party in the early hours of the morn-
ing, so that every one has to get up at 4.30 or 5
o’clock in the morning. And the same variations
must be made from time to time in the hours of eroingf
to sleep, so that children obtain permission to sit up.
To sit up from time to time, if not made a rule, is
very useful, because we thus break up too great a
uniformity in our habits and accustom ourselves to
go to sleep at different hours, and this makes us

STRENGTH OF CHARACTER.

221

less liable to sleeplessness. By getting accustomed
to go to sleep always at the same hour we soon find
ourselves incapable of sleep once the accustomed hour
is changed.

Of all the gifts given to mankind consciousness is
the most precious, and we must seek to strengthen
and to make it as much as possible voluntary, that is,
ready to answer to any call. To attain this it is
necessary to weaken as much as possible every
liability to half-awakening, every liability to sug-
gestions of every kind, and, consequently, it is
necessary to strengthen as much as possible the
intellectual forces, the capacity for judgment, because
they form, as direct experiments have shown us, the
best preservative against half-awakenings, suggesti-
bility, and the like.

As a general rule, the more easily consciousness is •
effaced under the influences of various causes, the
more predisposed is the subject to nervous and
mental diseases, including convulsive affections. So
true is this that medical science shows that men of
strong and decided character resist better than others
the influence of alcohol, chloroform, and other anaes-
thetics and narcotics, and also, as we have seen, the
half-waking state, in a word, all the influences which
interrupt the activity of consciousness. And if we
think of the meaning usually attributed to the word,
a strong character simply means a strong and uniform
consciousness. On the other hand, whatever weakens
consciousness also predisposes to nervous and mental
diseases; thus the frequent use of narcotics or alcohol,
attacks of epilepsy or narcolepsy, all conduce to
mental weakness and to mental disease. Even an
excess of normal sleep is injurious, and, still more,

222

SLEEP.

frequently repeated hypnosis. Thus it is easy to
undei stand tliat a pronounced hypnagogic state
may cause some anxiety, since it indicates a tend-
ency for consciousness to remain plunged in the
inactivity of sleep.

No doubt in our day there are whole groups of
persons who pass their lives in what may be called a
continuous hypnagogic state,— I do not mean among
savage populations, but in our own civilised European
world,— and who remain all their lives long in so low
a stage of development that, as the Russian poet says,
they only see their fellow-men in a dream. How can
we develop and strengthen the feeble pathological
consciousness of such persons? Before all thino-s,
certainly, by a genuine love of man, of one’s neigli-
bour, of the whole of humanity. That such a love of
ones fellow-man may work miracles even on primitive
savages and cannibals is shown by the life of the
indefatigable explorer, Miklucho-Macleay. Alone,
without any armed force, he ventured among can-
nibals who had never seen an European. Not only
did he return safe and sound, but he gained the
hearts of these savage hordes, not by brute force,
but by his own humanity and love of humanity even
in the forms of these poor creatures, who had yet had
no chance of taking their share in true human life.

All that such life means we are as yet unable to tell.
At present we cannot represent to ourselves what the
future life of man on earth will be when consciousness
shall have reached greater development. Bunge, in
his treatise on physiological chemistry, even goes
so far as to declare that the time will come when
man will have so far developed that between us
and this future humanity there will be the same

SLEEP AND CONSCIOUSNESS.

223

immeasurable distance that there now is between the
infusoria and contemporary man.

From all that goes before it is clear that there
is an intimate connection between sleep and con-
sciousness, and that the depth and amount of sleep
are in inverse proportion to energy of conscious-
ness, so that the study of both must follow a parallel
course. It is not, therefore, surprising that our know-
ledge of sleep, like that of consciousness, is but
fragmentary, and that, therefore, in this sketch of the
hygiene of sleep I have been forced to search in
various and scattered directions for the facts and ob-
servations which I have here tried to work into a more
or less homogeneous and complete whole. On many
points medical literature furnishes as yet no infor-
mation, even in the form of isolated facts. It was
therefore necessary, in part to undertake new experi-
mental studies, in part to acknowledge that in the
present state of science it is impossible to furnish
precise answers to a whole series of questions con-
cerning essential points in the knowledge of life
during sleep. The reader must, therefore, be in-
dulgent towards lacunae which can only be filled up
by the united labour of many experimenters.

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228

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p. 464.

229

CHAPTER IV.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SLEEP.

In Sleep each enters his own Psychic World — The Independent
Life of the Nervous and Cerebral Centres — Subjective
Visual Images — Hypnagogic phenome7ia — Subjective Audi-
tory Images — Presentation Dreams and Representation
Dreams — Part played by the various Sense Organs in
Dreams — Sights Hearings Touch, Taste, Smell, etc. —
Visceral Organs and Ccencesthesia in Dreaming — The Mus-
cular Sense in Dreams — Failure of Movement in Dreams
— The Emotions in Dreams — Dreaming is associated with
Intellectual Development — The Speech Element in Dreams
— Positive and Negative Images left by Dream Forms —
Causality in Dreaming— Dreaming in relation to Insanity
— The Analogy of Alcoholic Insartity to Dreaming — Morbid
Dreams — Prodromic Dreams — Dreams as Symptoms of
Disease — Nightmare — The Dreams of the Blind — The
Dreams oj Persons with Amputated Limbs — The Dreams of
Criminals — The Utility of Dreams — The Significance of
Dreaming.

As we have already seen, the sleep of the brain is
only partial. Thus during sleep there is a certain
amount of psychic life, and this concluding chapter
will be devoted to the analysis and study of the
psychic life of sleep.

HeracleituSji and in modern times Kant and
Maudsley, have observed that while during waking

^ “ To those who are awake there is one world in common, but of
those who are asleep each is withdrawn into a private world of his
own ” (as quoted by Plutarch, De Superstit., 3).

230

SLEEP.

life each of us lives with a general life bound up with
the common existence of other human beings with
whom he is grouped, during sleep each of us is
buried in his own world. This remark — thus made
by thinkers who were in the first place metaphysicians
expresses the fundamental difference between the
study of man by anatomists, physiologists, and his-
tologists, and the study of man from the psychological
and subjective side. Physiologists and psycho-physio-
logists have determined the rapidity of the different
sensations along the nervous tracks; they have
measured the time required for an act of perception
or of will. They have begun to calculate the rapidity
and number of associations of ideas and images
(Galton, Trautschold, etc.). But the more these im-
portant facts are gathered and collected the stronger
becomes the conviction in the minds of serious in-
vestigators that by these methods we have only
reached the exterior side of man, and that such
facts do not serve to explain the intimate nature of
man, his essence, the kernel of his being. Thus we
know that the blood as it circulates through the
body is subject to hydrostatic and hydrodynamic
laws, and we know perfectly the structure and in-
nervation of cardiac muscle; but we cannot explain
the primary and fundamental cause of cardiac con-
traction, or that of the vessel walls. We may say
the same of the processes of digestion and absorption.
We know that the old theories which reduced nutrition
to phenomena of endosmosis, diffusion, and exosmosis
are false, since in these processes an active part is
played by the different cellular elements, which exert
choice among the substances brought to them along the
digestive tracts, and probably also among those brought

THE METHOD OF INTERNAL OBSERVATION. 23 1

in the blood ; but why they exert this choice, why,
for example, they absorb a drop of fat and refuse a
granule of pigment, remains quite unknown. And
even if we pretend to explain this elective affinity
by showing that what seems to be choice is really the
action of law, let us say of chemical affinity, we have
not discovered the reason of the phenomenon, but
only put the difficulty a step further back; for in
attempting to explain the facts by chemical affinity
we still have to explain chemical affinity itself.

As regards the action of the nervous and cerebral
system, this inability of physical science to give a
definite explanation is still more marked. We may
determine the rapidity with which a stimulus travels
along a nerve ; we may determine the time necessary
for the production of a conscious sensation or of an
act of will ; we may even measure the volume of
consciousness (Dietze); but we are not thereby helped
to understand the fundamental reason of psychic life,
nor to understand how a nervous stimulus and the
activity of certain nervous cells is transformed into a
conscious and living thought. To such an extent is
this the case that from a strictly biological point of
view it is often found convenient to ignore altogether
the psychic phenomena of consciousness as an un-
important epiphenomenon, absolutely useless for the
study of the phenomena of life.^

On these grounds it is now widely recognised
among men of science that in explaining the psychic
world of man we cannot dispense with internal
observation, and subjective methods of investigation
(Volkelt, Wundt, etc.); and even from the physical

^ See, F. Le Dantcc, Le Delenninisme Biologique et la

Personnaliti Conscien/e, 1897.

232

SLEEP.

side, Lunge, the distinguished Basle professor, insists
in his well-known treatise on physiological chemistry
on the need of studying the individual conscious-
ness. ^ Thus psychology regains the rights that at
one time it seemed to be losing.

In the study of sleep the subjective method is of
the^ first importance. In fact, all the complicated con-
ditions of social existence which during waking life we
are all obliged to conform to or to resist are elimi-
nated during sleep, and the psychic life of dreams
unrolls freely without the impeding fetters of social
laws. It cannot be denied that these social laws,
which surround every human existence, sometimes
become a heavy burden, and that they develop at
the same time a certain hypocrisy in feeling and
thought and action, and thus give rise to endless
falsehood and deceit. In sleep all this changes. We
are delivered from the heavy burden imposed by
those vital conditions which by virtue of historical
development have gained a certain empire in a given
nation or society, but which are very often at the
same time not merely opposed to the desires and
impulses of men, but even injurious to the develop-
ment and well-being of individuals who live in the
-midst of the nation or society. From all these con-
ventional chains we are liberated during sleep and
brought, as it were, face to face with Nature. During
sleep — as the philosophic physiologist Burdach re-
marked— all social differences disappear; and men
attain that perfect equality which in the waking state
they can only dream of. Thus an analysis of the
psychic phenomena of sleep seems to me adapted to
throw much interesting light on the subjective side
of man.

INDEPENDENT LIFE OF THE NERVES. 233

The Independent Life of the Nerves— Vision, ete.—
To understand the intimate nature of psychic life
during sleep we must first take into account what
the psycho-physiological language of the beginning
of the century called “ the life peculiar to the nerves,

“ the special life of the organs of sense, ‘ the chaos
of apparitions belonging to the sleepy state, etc.
(Johannes Muller, Purkinje, Grtiithuisen, Herschel),
and also of subjective visual phenomena. We must
ask ourselves in what this individual or “ essential
life of the different nervous and cerebral apparatus is,
and whether it possesses any serious significance.

In the first place, I may point out that it is
recognised that every nervous stimulus, every sensa-
tion or idea, leaves a trace in the cerebro-nervous
system, and thus all the obscure motions generated
in the organism may afterwards revive temporarily
under the impulsion of consciousness, or spontaneously
by the action of unknown causes, by the influence of
an unusual afflux of blood or other reason. At the
bottom of this faculty lies that “ memory ” which is
peculiar not only to each organ, but to each tissue, to
each cell of the body (Henle). It is by this “memory”
that some explain the preservation of species through
infinite series of generations and the hereditary
transmission of physical and mental characters. It
was in this way, as the after-images of sensation,
that even Aristotle seems to have accounted for '
dreams.

An English writer, Francis Cane, has summarised
the chief of the auto-sensations generated physio-
logically within the body, and sometimes increased or
modified by pathological conditions; and though even
the summary of these very numerous phenomena is

234

SLEEP,

somewhat long, it may be well to quote it here in its
bearing on the psychic life of sleep. “We must
remember that the human body is a complicated
machine made up of numerous secondary machines
in themselves composed of a most intricate molecular
machinery. This organism is unified and controlled
by the sensory and motor nerve filaments which com-
municate in leashes with the great central nervous
exc ange of the brain. It is ever changing from
rnmute to minute in its molecular constitution, and
these changes result in countless chemical reactions
and physical transformations of energy. It is most
delicately responsive to all its surroundings, and is
presided over by an intelligism which has impressed on
itself what I may call a sensographic record of all that it
has learned from the moment when the deep sleep of
Its embryonic existence was first broken by its birth
into the external world of matter and of sense.

“ Briefly considering what takes place in the human
body while asleep, we find that there are actual
and innumerable sounds, sights, and feelings which
are partially conveyed to the intelligism, while that
intelligism is deprived of its full means to test
their nature. We have twitchings or spasms of
muscular fibres, of muscles, and of groups of
muscles. We have extensions and contractions of
limbs, with the sensations of impediment likely to
accrue from tight or overmuch bedclothing. We
have painful conditions of muscles, nerves, and blood-
vessels from awkward positions of the sleeper. We
have the movements of the breathing apparatus;
heart movements and sensations of beating arteries
and distended veins; conditions of the sexual
apparatus and states of different organs, such as

SUBJECTIVE VISION.

235

distetxled bladder, overloaded stomach, and feeling
of flatus in the bowels. Sounds innumerable are
developed by the heart and arteries and veins; by
the mouth and nose, as in snoring, grinding of teeth,
and working of saliva; and many mechanical noises in
the ears themselves. There are, besides, a host of mole-
cular sounds which must be present, although usually
not perceived. In the eye we have those extra-
retinal entoptic phenomena due to opaque particles
in the transparent media, which, in our waking
moments, frequently appear proj’ected into space
as drops, striie, lines, twisted bodies, forms of
grotesque shape, and black dancing spots, often
mistaken by the ignorant or inexperienced for
natural objects, such as flies, worms, or birds.^ As
an intra-retinal appearance I may mention the way
in which we can see the branches of vessels in our own
retinae under the form of Purkinje’s spectre. More-
over, there are the numerous pathological conditions,
such as hyperaesthesia or dysaesthesia of one or more
nerves, set of nerves, or branches. In the optic
nerve these conditions cause photopsia or flashes
of light, flames, sparks, and stars. In the auditory
nerve we have humming, buzzing, singing, ringing
of bells, violent explosions, and even words or
conversations. In the olfactory nerve and nerves
of taste we have odours and flavours. Many
of these pathological phenomena are simply the
hyperaesthetic nerves picking up the physiological

^ For an interesting series of cases, illustrating Dr. Cane’s remarks
on this point, see a paper by Dr. W. Colman describing hallucinations
occurring during ill health in some persons, and associated with dis-
orders in the sensory organs and the presence of floating bodies in the
eye, etc., British Medical Journal, I2ih May 1894

236

SLEEP.

sights, sounds, and sensations. The visual aspect of
dreams, or how we see light, colour, and form, is thus,
to my mind, made quite clear when we come to study
the lights existing or developed in the organism.
From the nature and composition of the body it is
physically certain that they must be present. Phos-
phorus emits light; so do calcic sulphide, boric
sulphide, chalk, silk, teeth, and other substances.
The emission of light is one of the properties of
protoplasm. Phosphorus enters largely into the
composition of the human body, being present as
phosphates in the bone;s and other tissues. It exists
in muscle as a combination of phosphoric acid. It
exists as a phosphuretted fat in the lecithin of blood-
corpuscles and of nerve and brain tissue. As
oxygen is being constantly conveyed to these phos-
phuretted tissues, light will certainly be* generated.
It would be interesting to know if a micro-photograph
of the circulation could be taken after long exposure
in darkness with a very sensitive plate. Pressure on
the globe of the eye, even in the dark, will produce
phosphenes, which appear as flashes of light or pale
luminous centres, with circles of one or more colours.
These are also produced by electrical currents. In a
dark room with our eyes closed, we see that area of
dim light called ‘the proper field of the retina,’ and
across which many see dim moving figures and shades
of colour, which blend and dissolve fantastically.
This field gets gradually brighter the longer we
abstain from viewing actual light. Therefore, from
the chemical reactions involved, from biological
analogy, and from physiological and pathological
facts, we have good reason to believe that there is
actual light produced within the body itself We know

SUBJECTIVE ITEARINC. 237

that heat in varying intensity is produced, and that
electricity is also developed by muscular activity.

We all know these phenomena more or less. We
have sometimes heard melodies, or sometimes a voice
calling us by name, in the absence of any exterior sound.
All such phenomena are the results of the subjective

1 Francis E. Cane, “The Physiology of Dreams,” Lancet, 28th
December 1889. Dr., Cane has some further interesting remarks con-
cerning the spontaneous evolution of light phenomena in animals
generally : — “ We have numerous examples in nature of organisms
developing light within themselves. Many plants, including some
cryptogams, are luminous. A large portion of animal nature is phos-
phorescent, of which we have familiar examples in the glow-worms and
fire-flies. Mr. Hoyle, of the Challetiger expeditions, has written some
interesting matter on this subject. The general phosphorescence of the
sea is due to pyrocystis, peridinium, noctiluca miliaris, and other low
microscopic forms in their counUess millions. Certain animalcules
found in the tropics give off phosphorescent particles so diffusive that
a tumbler of water containing one will become completely illuminated.
The bright spots we see at the sides and in the wakes of vessels are due
to salpse, medusse, and copepods, or surface crustaceans. Other crus-
taceans, several families of annelids, some beetles, and many fishes are
phosphorescent. The luminous round shining bodies found on certain
fish contain in their interior little lenticular bodies like eyes, and are
considered by some naturalists as true organs of vision, or accessory-
eyes. Some crustaceans have also these eye-like organs. The light
given out by phosphorescent animals is usually pale bluish in colour,
but red, green, and purple are noticed in some animals. A form of
apendicularia has the power to change its light from red to green, and
finally blue. The intensity of the light is not very great, that of the
sea at its brightest being obliterated by very little moonlight. The
nature of the light is always monochromatic. The causes of phosphor-
escence are probably various. Some animals get luminous from feeding
on putrid phosphorescent matter. Dead and putrescent animals are
frequently phosphorescent. This is well known in the examples of fish
and molluscs. The human cadaver is occasionally phosphorescent, and
Phipson, in his work on Phosphorescence, records instances where
human beings have been phosphorescent while alive. This is the
case in the rare condition of phosphoridrosis or luminous sweat, which
is sometimes seen in the last stages of phthisis, in miliaria, and in persons
who have eaten putrid fish.”

238

SLEliP.

activity of the auditory apparatus, whilethe same pheno-
mena are observed in all the other sensory spheres.

It need scarcely be added that the number of these
traces varies in various systems of fibres or cells, and
that their power of creating different images and
sensations, or even feelings and ideas, without the
help of exterior nervous stimuli and irritations, is the
more energetic the more abundant and rich these
traces are. For this reason the subjective phenomena
of vision, which have been especially studied, have a
predominant importance from the present point of
view and deserve our special attention.^

The best moment for observing the influence of
the visual apparatus in producing dreams and hypna-
gogic hallucinations is the moment before going to
sleep. Then we may often see passing before our
eyes a whole series of visual images; in some people
luminous phenomena predominate; in some, human
forms; while other people most often see flowers or
landscapes, or again, the capricious play of arabesques
or geometrical figures. These subjective pheno-

1 Hyslop {Metttal Physiology^ p. 267) enumerates the following

phenomena within the eye as causes of subjective hallucinations:

(l) Shadows formed upon the retina by opaque bodies. These are {a}
the spectrum muco-lacrimale ; {b) wrinkled shadows, due to folds in the
cornea ; {c) lens shadows ; [d) muscce volitantes. (2) Purkinjds figure,
due to a shadow of the blood-vessels within the retina cast upon the
most external layer of the retina. (3) Movements of the blood corpuscles
in the retinal capillaries. (4) Phe entoptical pulse, due to mechanical
irritation of the rods lying outside the pulsating arteries. (5) Pressure
phosphenes. (6) The observed when the eyes are moved rapidly

backwards and inwards, and which corresponds to the entrance of the
optic nerve. (7) accommodation spot, (8) Mechanical optical stimu-
lation; division of optic nerve causes flash of light, etc. (9) The accom-
modation phosthenes. (10) Electric phenomena, (ii) The yellow spot:
“ Lowe’s ring” and “ Haidinger’s brushes.” (12) Spectra, arising from
internal causes, such as increased blood pressure through retina, etc.

HYPNAGOGIC VISIONS.

239

mena of vision attracted the attention of Johannes
Muller, Purkinje, Griiithuisen, Herschel, Galton, Ladd,
and others. Their observations have shown that
while the phenomena exist in everybody they may
often remain wholly unnoticed. They are most
marked in youth, and many children are accustomed
to press their heads into the pillow and adopt an
attitude of expectant attention towards the visions
that then begifi to form* ; they disappear usually
on the approach of adult age, though sometimes
not until later. Some persons can only see these
subjective images when they shut their eyes in the
evening ; others possess the faculty of seeing them
not only at night but during the day, and even with
the eyes open. In some persons these images affect
all possible colours; in others they appear grey on
a grey background. It has also been found that
for these phenomena to attract attention a certain
power of observation is required ; that is why they
are chiefly found in intelligent persons. To concen-
trate the attention on them is, however, often enough
to cause them to disappear (Maury, Baillarger). To
a slight extent they depend on the will, and as
Burdach long since noted, they may to a certain
extent be modified at pleasure. He found that when
hideous and terrifying faces floated before his eyes,
by concentrating his attention on architectural forms
he was able to see figures of a kaleidoscopic character.
Another scientific observer. Dr. Weir Mitchell, re-
marks that from childhood he has been able to
summon visions before falling asleep, but that, once
present, they cannot be controlled, and change and
disappear of themselves.^

' Brit, Med, Jour. 5th Dec, 1896.

240

SLEEP.

One or two descriptions of these hypnagogic visions
by reliable writers who can speak from personal ex-
perience will serve to show their character and their
intimate relation to dream-images. There can be no
doubt that they are very common among children.^
Professor C. L. Herrick, the editor of the Journal of
Comparative Neurology, who also points this out, re-
marks that these hallucinations are involuntary, though
they may be caused to tarry a moment by close
attention, or dissipated by a sudden motion. In
childhood they frequently gave him great pleasure,
and in later years their vivid and charming land-
scapes, in natural colours, helped to mitigate the
tortures of insomnia. “These views,” he continues,
“rarely or never contained recognisable elements
from actual experience, nor could there be traced any
association with real or imaginary places. Sometimes
the images were of faces, and the expression varied
with kaleidoscopic frequency. There are many ana-
logies with the transformations which are occasioned
in one’s cloud-pictures by the changes in the forms of
the clouds. The two phenomena have this in com-
mon also, that there is in each case an objective
occasion — a genuine sense-irritation. In the case
of the dream hallucination the irritation seems to
be furnished by the congested blood-currents in the
retina or within the eye-ball.”^

^ Weygandt briefly describes his own experiences in childhood of
hypnagogic visions, Entstehung der Trdume, p. 43; they were espe-
cially associated with fatigue. In his case there were also similar
auditory phenomena, produced by closing the ears, etc. See also
“ Census of Hallucinations,” Proceedings Society of Psychical Research,
pp. 78 seq.

^ C. L. Herrick, “ Hallucinations of Vision in Chi\drer\,’’ fournai of
Comparative Neurology, July 1895.

IIVl'NAGOGIC VISIONS.

241

Mr. Greenwood, again, has recorded the hypnagogic
visions with which he has been familiar throughout
life. “ These faces are never seen except when the
eyelids are closed, and they have an apparent distance
of five or six feet Though they seem living enough,
they look through the darkness as if traced in chalks
on a black ground. Colour sometimes they have,
but the colour is very faint Indeed, their general
aspect is as if their substance were of pale smoke ;
and their outlines waver, fade, and revive (with the
effect, though not the aspect, of phosphorescent
limnings), so that except for the half of a moment,
the whole face is never completely or clearly visible
at one time. Always of a strikingly distinctive
character, these visionary faces are like none that can
be remembered as seen in life or in pictures.”

“In all likelihood,” he adds, “Blake’s visions were
some such phantoms as these, presented to his eyes
in broad daylight ; I am inclined to think so, because
his wonderful, dreadful drawing, ‘The Ghost of a
Flea,’ is precisely such a transcript as I could have
made by the score but for lack of his pictorial skill.
Under my own eyelids I have seen many a face of
the same awful family; some even more dreadful
still, being alive and astir with animation.” ^

A psychologist of distinction, Professor Ladd of
\ ale, has also of late studied these phenomena by
auto-observation.2 “ I verily believe,” he remarks,

^ Frederick Greenwood, Imagination in Dreams, 1894, pp. 14-20.
Mr. Greenwood is also liable to olfactory hallucinations. “ At
infrequent times of fatigue an evanescent but very distinct violet
scent flashes from my hands, or so I fancy.” Galton also mentions
a lady who was accustomed to see distinctly in hypnagogic vision
showers of red roses of which she could smell the perfume.

® Ladd, “ The Psychology of Visual Dreams,” Mind, 1892.

242

SLEEP.

“ there is no shape known to me by perception or by
fancy, whether of things on the earth or above the
earth or on the waters, that has not been schemati-
cally represented by the changing retinal images
under the influence of intra-organic stimulation.” He
has seen nowhere such beautiful colours as in the
dark. In his own case, at all events, he considers
“those visual dreams which follow almost imme-
diately on going to sleep in a dark room originate,
wholly or chiefly, in the Eigenlicht or essential light
of the retina,” and he believes that it is impossible
to make a hard and fast distinction between visual
perception and visual imagination in dream-life, so
far as the origin of their sense-elements is concerned;
in both the end-organ takes an active part. “ All
manner of inanimate things,” he adds, “of animals,
plants, and human beings, seen in dreams, may resolve
themselves into the fantastic schemata of the retinal
field, if we can only manage to surprise these schemata
with an observing critical consciousness.”

These images are in perpetual movement ; they
appear more or less distinct and then fade, giving
place to others. Often one figure arises from another,
one face from another (Marie de Manac^ine), or
different flowers ceaselessly arise from a bouquet of
flowers, like an endless rain of corollas (Goethe) ; or
(as in the case of a lady mentioned by Galton)
showers of red roses, as distinct as real flowers, turn
into a flight of golden spangles; or, as in Greenwood’s
case (as a child), a shower of scintillations would turn
into a flock of sheep going down hill. For the most
part, however, these subjective visual images repre-
sent miniature human faces, or else faces that seem
to be of natural size, Herschel correctly observes

HYrNAGOGIC VISIONS.

243

that such faces are rarely charming or beautiful,
but are usually stern, hideous, grotesque, even mon-
strous. The reason is, I believe, simply that in real
life ugly forms predominate over beautiful forms, and
that consequently in our neuro-cerebral system ugly
forms must inevitably leave more traces than beautiful
forms. A young girl, well known to me, instinctively
adopted from childhood a method of replacing the
hideous faces by more attractive faces : before going
to bed she would choose some picture representing
a beautiful face, and taking it with her, would gaze
at it before closing her eyes, telling her mother that
she did so “to have nice dreams and drive away the
ugly faces that come into my eyes before I go to
sleep.”

Schroder van der Kolk observed that a change of
position in bed would efface these visions, and also
remarked that if they appear to a troublesome extent
they may be dissipated by the application of a cold
compress to the forehead ; under the influence of this
application they become pale, fade, and disappear.^
This would seem to indicate that, to some extent,
this phenomenon is due to the amount of blood
flowing to the brain.

Visions in all respects similar to hypnagogic
hallucination, but more abundant and more gorgeous,

^ It may here be mentioned that, according to Delaunay (in a com-
munication to the Society of Biology of Paris in 1882), similar influences
affect dreams ; thus he found that a layer of cotton wool on the heacj,
by raising the temperature, makes dreams more vivid and intelligent ;
he also pointed out that dreams in the supine position are agitated,
sensuous, and erotic, while he found that lying on the right side pro-
duced absurd and extravagant dreams mostly referring to remote
events, while lying on the left side produced more reasonable dreams,
referring chiefly to recent events. ,

244

SLEEP.

may be produced by various drugs, more especially
by mescal button {Anhalonium Lewinii)^ which is
largely used by the Indians of New Mexico, and has
lately been investigated by Prentiss and Weir Mitchell
in America and Havelock Ellis in England. The de-
scriptions by Weir Mitchell, a distinguished physician
and careful observer, of the effect of this vision-
breeding drug upon himself are so vivid, and bring
before us so clearly the formation of hypnagogic
images and indirectly of dreams, that they are worth
quoting at some length. It should be noted that,
like “faces in the dark” (which Dr. Weir Mitchell
has been able to summon ever since childhood), these
visions usually disappear as soon as the eyes are
opened, ana that will is without action on them, though
suggestion seems to have some slight influence;—

My eyes being closed, I began to see tiny points of light,
like stars or fire-flies, which came and went in a moment. The
star points became many, and then I began to observe some-
thing like fragments of stained glass windows. The glass was
not very brilliant, but the setting, which was irregular in form,
seemed to be made of incessantly flowing sparkles of pale silver,
now going here, now there, to and fro, like, as I thought, the
inexplicable rush and stay and reflux of the circulation seen
through a lens. These window patterns were like fragments
coming into view and fading.

“The display which for an enchanted two hours followed
was such as I find it hopeless to describe in language which
shall convey to others the beauty and splendour of what I saw.
During these two hours I was generally wide awake. I was
comfortable, save as to certain gastric conditions, which were
not so severe as to distract attention. Time passed with little
sense for me of its passage. I was critically attentive, watchful,
interested, and curious, making all the time mental notes for
future use.

“ Especially at the close of my experience I must, I think,
have been for a while in the peculiar interval between the

MESCAL INTOXICATION.

245

waking state and that of sleep— the ‘ praedormitum' — the time
when we are apt to dream half-controlled stories ; but as to this
I am not very sure. As a rule I was on guard, with every power
of observation and reflection in full activity.

“ My first vivid show of mescal colour effects came quickly.
I saw the stars, and then, of a sudden, here and there delicate
floating films of colour — usually delightful neutral purples and
pinks. These came and went — now here, now there. Then an
abrupt rush of countless points of white light swept across the
field of view, as if the unseen millions of the Milky Way were
to flow, a sparkling river, before the eye. In a minute this was
over and the field w’as dark. Then I began to see zigzag lines
of very bright colours, like those seen in some megrims. I
tried to fix the place and relation of these tints, but the changes
were such as to baffle me. One was an arch of angled lines of
red and green, but of what else I could not determine. It w'as
in rapid, -what I may call minute, motion.

“ The tints of intense green and red shifted and altered, and
soon were seen no more. Here again was the wonderful love-
liness of swelling clouds of more vivid colours, gone before I
could name them, and, sometimes rising from the lower field,
and very swiftly altering in colour-tones from pale purples and
rose to greys, with now and then a bar of level green or orange,
intense as lightning and as momentary.

“ When I opened my eyes all was gone at once. Closing
them, I began after a long interval to see for the first time
definite objects associated with colours. The stars sparkled
and passed away. A white spear of grey stone grew up to huge
height, and became a tall, richly finished Gothic tower of very
elaborate and definite design, with many rather worn statues
standing in the doorways or on stone brackets. As 1 gazed,
every projecting angle, cornice, and even the face of the stones
at their joinings were by degrees covered or hung with clusters
of what seemed to be huge precious stones, but uncut, some
being more like masses of transparent fruit. These were green,
purple, red, and orange ; never clear yellow and never blue.
All seemed to possess an interior light, and to give the faintest
idea of the perfectly satisfying intensity and purity of these
gorgeous colour-fruits is quite beyond my power. All the
colours I have ever beheld are dull as compared to these.

246

SLEEP.

“ As 1 looked, and it lasted long, the tower became of a fine
mouse hue, and everywhere the vast pendent masses of emerald
green, ruby reds, and orange began to drip a slow rain of
colours. All this while nothing was at rest a moment. The
balls of colour moved tremulously. The tints became dull, and
then, at once, past belief vivid ; the architectural lines were al!
active with shifting tints. The figures moving shook the long,
hanging lines of living light, and then, in an instant, all was
dark.

“After an endless display of less beautiful marvels 1 saw that
which deeply impressed me. An edge of a huge cliff seemed to
project over a gulf of unseen depth. My viewless enchanter
set on the brink a huge bird-claw of stone. Above, from the
stem or leg, hung a fragment of some stuff. This began to
unroll and float out to a distance wjjich seemed to me to
represent Time as well as immensity of Space. Here were
miles of rippled purples, half transparent, and _of ineffable
beauty. Now and then soft golden clouds floated from these
folds, or a great shimmer went over the whole of the rolling
purples, and things, like green birds, fell from it, fluttering
down into the gulf below. Next, I saw clusters of stones hang-
ing in masses from the claw toes, as it seemed to me miles of
them, down far below into the underworld of the black gulf.

“ This was the most distinct of my visions. Incautiously I
opened my eyes, and it was gone. A little later I saw inter-
laced and numberless hoops in the air all spinning swiftly and
all loaded with threaded jewels or with masses of colour in long
ropes of clustered balls. I began to wonder why I saw no
opals, and some minutes after each of these circles, which
looked like a boy’s hoop, became huge opals ; if I should say
fluid opals it would best describe what was, however, like
nothing earthly.

“ I set myself later to seeing if I could conjure figures, for so far
I had seen nothing human in form, nor any which seemed alive.
I had no luck at this, but a long while after I saw what seemed
a shop with apothecaries’ bottles, but of such splendour, green,
red, purple, as are not outside of the pharmacies of fairyland.

“ On the left wall was pinned by the tail a brown worm of
perhaps a hundred feet long. It was slowly rotating, like a
Catherine wheel, nor did it seem loathly. As it tunied, long

EPILEPTIC VISUAL AURA2.

247

green and. red tentacles fell this way and that. On a bench neai
by two little dwarfs, made, it seemed, of leather, were blowing
through long glass pipes of green tint, which seemed to me to
be alive, so intensely, vitally green were they. But it were vain
to find in words what will describe these colours. Either they
seemed strangely solid, or to possess vitality. They still linger
visibly in my memory, and left the feeling that I had seen
among them colours unknown to my experience.

“Their variety and strange juxtapositions were indeed fas-
cinating for one to whom colour is more than it is to most
men ; nor is it possible to describe the hundredth of what I
saw. I was at last conscious of the fact that at that moment
I was almost asleep, and then wide awake. In one of these
magic moments I saw my last vision and the strangest. I
heard what appeared to be approaching rhythmical sounds,
and then saw a beach, which I knew to be that of Newport.
On this, with a great noise, which lasted but a moment, rolled
in out of darkness wave on wave. These as they came were
liquid splendours huge and threatening, of wonderfully pui'e
green, or red or deep purple, once only deep orange, and with
no trace of foam. These water hills of colour broke on the
beach with myriads of lights of the same tint as the wave.
This lasted some time, and while it did so I got back to more
distinct consciousness, and wished the beautiful terror of these
huge mounds of colour would continue.

“A knock at my door caused me to open my eyes, and I lost
whatever of wonder might have come after.”

Dr. Weir Mitchell found that talking in no way
interfered with the visions, though they were dispelled
by opening the eyes. He saw all colours but blue ;
his assistant, however, who also took the drug, found
that he saw blue, and there were other individual
differences.^

Closely related to these phenomena, but mainly
due to the spontaneous discharges in the cerebral

^ S. Weir Mitchell, “ The Effects of Mescal Button,” British
Medical Journal, 5 th December 1896; Plavelock Ellis, “The Pheno-
mena of Mescal Intoxication,” Lancet, 5th June 1897.

248

sleep.

centres of vision— not, as in the cases chiefly dealt
with hitheito, to the action of the cerebral centres on
spontaneous retinal and allied phenomena, — are the
subjective visual sensations which occur at the onset
of epileptic fits before actual loss of consciousness
occurs; and also the closely- allied but distinct
phenomena associated with migraine. In association
with epilepsy, stars, or flashes of colour, especially
yellowish-red flame, are very common ; while in
migraine the visions seen are more partial and
limited. These phenomena, which have been care-
fully studied by Gowers,^ are pathological, and outside
our present subject.

It is the same with subjective phenomena of
hearing as with those of vision. Words, tunes,
and other sounds may echo, it seems in our ears,
sometimes without, sometimes within the head.
In disease, but without insanity, these phenomena
are more marked. In disease of the labyrinth there
are noises of an indefinite character, humming,
buzzing, whirring, roaring. In local disease of the
brain there may be the ringing of bells or the playing
of music.^

Tarchanoffs experiments throw an interesting light
on the different localisation of the subjective pheno-
mena of hearing. He showed that if by means of
two telephones we introduce into each ear sounds
of absolutely equal intensity, we perceive them, not
in the ears, but in the middle of the head. If the

• MV. R. Gowers, “Subjective Visual Sensations” (Bowman lecture
before Ophthalmological Society), Nature, 4th July 1S95.

2 Colman, Brit. Med. Journal, May 12th 1894. The facts and
theories of auditory hallucination, as well as of hallucinatory phenomena
generally, have been exhaustively studied by Parish, Hallucinations
and Illusions (Contemporary Science Series), 1897.

LOCALISATION OF SUBJECTIVE SOUNDS. 249

sound is decreased in one of the telephones the
apparent centre of sensation is displaced towards the
ear which receives the stronger sound, and by con-
tinuing this decrease the point of sensation approaches
still further towards the ear which receives most
sound. For the success of the experiment it is
necessary, not only that the initial sounds should be
of perfectly equal intensity, but also that the sense
of hearing should be equally keen on both sides.
All those who undergo this experiment, as I am
myself able to bear witness, find that the sensation
of sound in the middle of the head is most oppressive
and unpleasant, and we have cause to be thankful
that our ears are so situated that, under natural
conditions, it is impossible for sounds of equal
intensity and quality to enter them simultaneously.
Tarchanoff's experiments seem to suggest that the
sensation of voices in the middle of the head which
is often found in insanity may be due to uniform
irritation of the two auditory centres, while pre-
dominance in one centre may lead to the external
localisation of the sounds. Such sounds when heard
by healthy persons in the middle of the head do not
usually produce so painful an impression, because
they are more or less weak and indistinct, but if they
become more marked they begin to be fatiguing.

It may be asked whether subj'ective phenomena
are associated with the same nervous and cerebral
processes as when the organs of sense are normally
stimulated. To this question an affirmative answer
must be given ; for the whole organism is based on
the law that every reminiscence or repetition of past
movement or sensation is accompanied, in the tissues
and organs concerned, by changes and processes

250

SLEEP.

analogous to those produced during the actual
accomplishment of those movements or sensations.
The existence of this law was long ago shown by
Erasmus Darwin by means of a very ingenious
experiment. It is recognised that more or less
repose of the sensory organs accentuates their im-
pressionability by stimuli. Darwin made use of this
fact to show that the representation or reminiscence
of sensations, formerly experienced in reality, is
accompanied by a certain activity of the corre-
sponding nervous apparatus. His experiment was
purely subjective, and so simple that any one may
repeat it on himself. Having requested the subject
to shut his eyes, Erasmus Darwin told him to fix his
attention on a certain well-known song or melody,
and then, suddenly opening his eyes, to note to what
extent the sunlight produced painful dazzling. After
an interval he caused the same subject to close his
eyes again and fix his mind upon some visual
object, such as a friend or a well known landscape,
and then, on suddenly opening his eyes, to note the
degree to which he was painfully dazzled by the
light. According to Darwin, the eyes are much less
dazzled by the light in the latter case than in the
former. I have myself often repeated this experi-
ment and obtained the same results. I am convinced,
also, that similar results may be obtained with the
other sense organs ; thus cold water seems much
colder to us if before immersing the hands in it we
think of sensations of heat or of something without
reference to sensations of temperature, while, on the
contrary, it seems less cold if beforehand we con-
centrate the mind on impressions of cold.

Like the organs of sight and hearing, the other

THOUGHT AND MOVEMENT.

251

organs have each their own subjective life, with puiely
subjective phenomena. The cutaneous nerves often
give subjective sensations of heat or cold 5 the tingling
or tickling which we feel at the extremities of the
fingers when we concentrate our attention on them
(John Hunter) is only a phenomenon of the subjective
life of the tactile nerves. It is certain, however, that
visual subjective phenomena are the most numerous
and varied; and this is natural, since the organ of
sight plays the chief part in the development of our
psychic life.

Thus every representation or reminiscence of a
sensation produces in the corresponding appa-
ratus and tissues changes and processes which are
distinguished quantitatively, but certainly not qualita-
tively, from the processes which are developed there
during primary and “real” sensations. Direct ex-
periment (Spirro, Beard, Preyer, Jastrow) has shown
that it is enough to think of a movement to produce
in the corresponding muscular group, though in an
attenuated form, the contractions necessary for the
accomplishment of that movement. This is in-
geniously demonstrated by Jastrow’s automato-
graph.^

It is due to the fact that mental activity is thus
really physical activity that we experience fatigue
after dreams; and that, for instance, after a dream of
running it is possible to awake tired and lame.^

This neuro-muscular characteristic is taken advan-
tage of by “ thought-readers.” In the same way, when

^ Jfislrow, “A Study of Involuntary Islov&m&nis,,'' Am. Jour. Psych.,
1892, p. 308.

” Sarah Weed and Florence Hallam, “ A Study of Dream-Conscious-
ness,” Amer, Jour, of Psych., April 1896, p. 406.

252

SLEEP,

we think of words there are traces of the movements
necessary to articulate that word, as it w'ere the more
or less imperceptible redection of the muscular con-
tractions necessary to form the real pronunciation of
that word. Lehmann and Hansen have showm that
this unconscious whispering may even be so marked
as to account for some of the phenomena of “thought-
transference”; and their results have been confirmed
by Professor Sidgwick.^

It IS easy to understand that the more feebly
developed is the conscious side of man, and the less
able he is to govern himself, so much the more
marked should be tlie manifestation of these sub-
jective traces in the muscles and nerves; and thus

we may account for the tendency to imitation among
children and savages.

This singular faculty of the neuro-cerebral and
muscular organisation has great significance in moral
development, if we believe, with Schopenhauer, that
the basis of morality is to be found in the sentiment
of pity. To feel pity, we must feel the reflection,
however feeble, of the griefs and pains of others in
our own nerves, tissues, and organs; and that would
not be possible if we were unable to reverberate the
feelings and sensations which enter into the sub-
stance of our thought; if, that is to say, we were
not so organised that at the mere thought of a
movement or state we did not feel throughout the
body impulses and tendencies similar to those of

^ Lehmann and Hansen, PInlosopkische Studien, 1895, P- 47 • 5
Sidgwick, “Experiments in Involuntary Whispering,” Drilter Inter-
nationale Congress fiir Psychologies p. 404. Sidgwick points out
that this phenomenon could only account for a particular group of the
phenomena of thought-transference.

THE NATURE OF EMOTION.

253

which we thought.^ Thus the same organic aptitude
which, on one side, compels our children to repeat
involuntarily the movements and grimaces which
they see, leads on the other hand to the develop-
ment of the feeling of altruism, which is the chief
basis of all morals. To pursue this matter further
would, however, lead us beyond our subject.

If the essential life of the neuro-cerebral apparatus
were more studied the fundamental difference be-
tween emotion and thought would be better under-
stood than at present it is. There can, however, be
little doubt that this difference may be chiefly reduced
to the fact that fundamentally, as Mosso, James,
Lange, Ribot, and others have shown, at the bottom
of the emotions may always be found a subjective ex-
citation of the peripheral nervous apparatus, including
more or less marked vasomotor phenomena, such as
redness, pallor, slowing or quickening of pulse, etc.,
while at the bottom of thought may also be found a
subjective activity, but less in the peripheral apparatus
than in the cerebral centres, except in so far as it may
be associated with muscular movements, especially, for
instance, those of speech, so that our thoughts are often
accompanied by an echo of the words composing it.

I have discussed the subjective or essential life of
the neuro-cerebral apparatus at some length, because
this life forms to a very large extent the basis of
dreaming, and also of imagination generally. The
psychic life of sleep rests mainly on these properties
of the organism. Without this subjective but in-
voluntary life of the nerves and brain we should never
have dreams nor hallucinations.

Series)^ Psychology of the Emotions (Contemporary Science

254

SLEEP.

VVe thus reach the conclusion that dreams are
products of the same processes which produce hallu-
cinations, and we also recognise that the subjective
life of the neuro-cerebral apparatus depends directly
on the quantity of the accumulated traces in any given
region of the organisation, though, as we shall see, we
have also to take into account the influence of ex-
ternal stimuli which, more especially since the almost
classical investigations of Maury, have been recognised
as playing a large part in dreams. As we should
expect, therefore, dreams have their chief origin in
those regions of the organism which are most active
during the waking state. Thus dreams are mainly
made up of visual images, and if, for instance, we ex-
perience a storm in a dream, the storm is constituted
by lightning, and the thunder is absent. We are
justified in stating that visual dreams, complicated by
auditory representations, constitute about 6o per cent
of the whole. Purely auditory dreams only occur in
musicians. In 35 per cent cases the dreams com-
bine impressions of sight with those of touch, the
temperature sense or the muscular sense ; while
olfactory and gustative sensations only complicate
the dream in about 5 per cent cases. In the care-
fully recorded results of observations by Miss Weed
and Miss Hallam on 381 dreams by themselves and
four fellow-students, 84.5 per cent, were visual, 67.7
per cent, were auditory, 10.8 per cent dermal, 6.3 per
cent, gustatory, and 6.9 per cent olfactory.

Similar results have been obtained in the study of
hallucinations in the sane. Not less than 62 per cent
of the 1700 persons who were found by the English
Committee on Hallucinations appointed by the Society
for Psychical Research to have experienced hallucina-

THE CLASSIFICATION OF DREAMS. 255

tions, reported visual hallucinations, while auditory
hallucinations constituted 28 per cent, and tactile
10 per cent At the same time the actual frequency
of auditory and tactile hallucinations, as the Com-
mittee point out, is greater than these results indicate,
since such hallucinations, being more trivial and of
briefer duration, make a less profound impression and
more easily fade. from memory.^

Many years earlier similar results had been obtained
with reference to the hallucinations of the insane ;
thus Macario found that hallucinations of sight and
hearing were most frequent, and then in the order of
decreasing frequency those of touch, smell, and taste.
(It is generally found that among the insane the audi-
tory hallucinations are more frequent than the visual,
the proportion being estimated by some authorities as
3 to I, by others as 5 to i.) This general analogy
is not strange when we remember that the images
of dreams belong strictly to the same class as hallu-
cinations, and are to be accounted for in the same
way.

The analysis of dreams reveals that they fall into
two groups — those occasioned or accompanied by
peripheral excitation, and those that are due to central
cerebral excitation. The former were called by Spitta
N ervenreiztrdmm, the latter psychische Trdiune. Miss
Calkins calls the former presentation dreams, the latter
representation dreams.^

’ “ Report on the Census of Hallucinations,” Proc. So(. Psychical
Research, vol. x., August 1894.

Nearly a century ago Hartley ^Observations on Man) already

recognised this distinction, dividing the causes of dreams into (i)

impressions and ideas lately received ; (2) present state of the body; (3)
association. Fenizia (“ Delle Cause esterne nei Archivio per

I Antropologia, 1896) subdivides the external causes into direct and

256

SLEKl’.

The Investigation of dreaming carried on by Miss
Calkins of Wellesley College, under the superintend-
ence of Professor Sanford of Clark University, is
undoubtedly one of the most important investigations
into the matter which have been brought forward of
recent years, and it may be well to reproduce some
of the results.^ Miss Calkins’ study is based on the
accurate record of the dreams of two people — herself
at the age of twenty-eight and a man of thirty-
two — who took notes on 55 consecutive nights and
recorded 205 dreams. They did not consider them-
selves unusually frequent dreamers. Paper, pencil,
candle, and matches were placed close at hand, and
during the first weeks of the experiment an alarum
clock was used to wake the experimenter at different
hours of the night; this was discontinued, because in
the excitement of waking through its agency con-
nected memory of the dream was often lost. Some-
times even the effort of lighting the candle dissipated
the memory of the dream. They were able to
confirm the general opinion that most dreams occur
during light morning sleep, though the sleep of the
middle of the night is in no sense a dreamless sleep.
A very close connection was found between dream-
life and waking life ; in only 1 1 per cent, of the
dreams was it impossible to discover such connection,

indirect. Giessler {Die pliysiologischen' Beziehungen der Traumvor-
gauge, 1896, p. 43) has lately furnished an elaborate classification ol
dreams, based not on their origin, but on their total character in
accordance with whether the active or the passive process of apper-
ception predominates.

1 Mary Whiton Calkins, “Statistics of Dreams,” Am. Jour. Psych.,
April 1893. A similar investigation on other subjects was subsequent!)
carried out, under the superintendence of Miss Calkins, by Sarah \\eecl
and Florence Hallam, “A Study of the Dream-Consciousness,” Am.
Jour, Psych., April 1896.

PRESENTATION DREAMS.

257

The dreams after four o’clock tended to be the most
vivid, though there was no absolute distinction. Only
a relatively small number of dreams could be shown
to include any sense perception. In these the auditory
dreams were of most importance, Miss Calkins remarks,
since hearing is more easily stimulated during sleep
than vision. Dermal sensations were comparatively
frequent ; smell,, taste, and organic sensation rarer.
The representative elements — which in a sense must
be found in all dreams, since the very transfor-
mation of the sense-excitation of the presentation
dream into an image requires the associative process
— occurred in the following order: visual, auditory,
vocal (twice as frequent in Miss Calkins, who
thinks habitually with words, as in her fellow-
experimenter), dermal, olfactory, general sensation.
The dream always took place at the present time,
and even when it concerned the home of child-
hood the apparent age of the dreamer was never
lessened to avoid anachronism. It was, however, the
unimportant events of recent life, and very seldom
the seriously significant facts, which entered into the
dieams.^ Paramnesia was found to be very frequent.
In most respects the subsequent observations by Miss
Weed and Miss Hallam on the same lines confirmed
the results reached by Miss Calkins, though they
served to show that individual differences are con-
siderable.

The comparative infrequency of presentation dreams

1 This point was insisted on by Delage, who found that important
events only enter into the psychic life of sleep when they have ceased to
occupy acutely the waking consciousness. (Ives Delage, Revue Scien-
tijique, nth July 1891.) As we shall see also (p. 267), Sante de Sanctis
confirms this conclusion. The opposite statement is, however, still
current in psychological works.

258

SLEEP.

connected with the visual sense — apart from those
of subjective peripheral origin with which we have
already dealt in connection with hypnagogic pheno-
mena— has often been pointed out. When they do
occur they are usually due to a bright light, especially
to the morning sun. Thus Weygandt dreamt on one
occasion that he was looking at “living pictures”
under magnesium light, and found on awaking that
the sun had just burst from behind the clouds; while
Hammond mentions a gentleman who dreamed of
being in heaven and was dazzled by its brilliancy,
finding, when he awoke, that the smouldering fire
had kindled into a bright flame, the light from which
fell on his face. Max Simon also, who at one time
preferred to sleep in a room without curtains in order
to enjoy the morning light, found that in his early
morning dreams he frequently found himself in
edifices bathed in floods of dazzling light, while
everything seemed animated and joyous.^

Professor Hourly Void has lately investigated the
dreams produced by the contemplation of various
objects immediately before going to sleep. His ex-
periments, which have been carried on during seven
years, consist in gazing at a small plastic coloured
object or figure, taken out of a packet of such objects,
so that the subject experiences a certain element of
surprise, and also in looking through coloured glass.
Some 300 experiments were made. It very seldom
happened that the form, size, and colour of the object
all remained unchanged ; the most interesting results
relate to colour. A small black object on a white

1 Max Simon, Le Monde des Rives, 1888, ch. ii. The same author
records a number of presentative dreams referring to all the senses as
well as to the visceral sensations.

AUDITORY DREAMS.

259

background, or vice versa, produced the following
various results: — (i) Simultaneous or successive,
sometimes repeated, contrasts of light and dark;
(2) reappearance of the colour to dream-conscious-
ness, either in connection with an image resembling
the object shown, or in connection with some other
known object which was really of different colour,
or else as ruling the whole dream; while the back-
ground is either of the same colour or is not per-
ceived ; (3) the colour is weakened, darkened or
changed in shade; (4) the complementary colour
appears as a background to the object. In the case
of other colours, especially red, similar results were
found, and the colour appeared in the dream, either
the same, or lighter, or darker ; and sometimes its
complementary colour appeared with or without the
colour experimented withd

Dreams due to auditory stimuli are extremely
numerous; the ticking of a watch, the banging of a
door, a steam whistle, the fall of some article in the
room above, are among the commonest sounds which
may produce dreams in which appalling catastrophes
seem to occur; while there are some persons who
uream in response to whispered suggestions. Among
dermal sensations perhaps the most remarkable dreams
have been produced by hot-water bottles applied to
the feet. Under this stimulus some have dreamed
that they were walking on hot lava or being led by
Satan over the burning marl of hell ; an American
gentleman dreamed that he was being tortured in the
Rocky Mountains by Mexicans, who, on his refusal to

^ J. Hourly Void, “ Einige Experimente liber Gesichtsbilder im
Traum,” Dritter Internationale Congress fiir Psychologie, Munich

1897, pp. 355-357.

26o

SLEEP.

reveal how gold could be made from copper, held his
feet to the fire till he shrieked with agony, and awoke
to find that the blanket which protected his feet from
the hot bottle had become disarranged ; a lady imagined
that she was a bear who was being taught to dance
by being made to stand on hot iron plates; another,
that she was escaping from a burning house that
scorched her feet, or that she was wading through
a natural hot spring.^ It must, however, be repeated
that such presentative dreams, though striking when
they occur, are by no means a frequent accompani-
ment of sensory stimuli. The existence of presenta-
tive dreams of smell and taste is undoubted, and was
well established by Maury’s well-known experiments;
as an example of a dream due to smell it is sufficient
to refer to the case of a doctor who had to spend the
night in the very odorous house of a cheesemonger,
and who heard the rats behind the wainscot before he
went to sleep to dream that, for some political offence,
he had been incarcerated in a cheese which shortly
afterwards was invaded by an army of rats, who began
to fix themselves upon his naked body;^ while, as an
example of an elaborate taste-dream, reference may be
made to the young lady who, as Hammond tells us,
sought to cure herself of the habit of thumb-sucking
acquired in babyhood by covering the offending thumb
with extract of aloes; “during the night she dreamed
that she was crossing the ocean in a steamer made of
wormwood, and that the vessel was furnished through-
out with the same material, and the emanations so
pervaded all parts of the ship that it was impossible

^ Most of these examples are given by Hammond in the introductory
chapters on Sleep in his Treatise on Insanity, pp. 226 et seq.

Jour, of Psych. Med., 1st July 1856.

TASTE-DREAMS.

261

to breathe without tasting the bitterness; everything
that she ate or drank was likewise impregnated with
the flavour. When she arrived at Havre she asked
for a glass of water to wash the taste from her mouth,
but they brought her an infusion of wormwood, which
she gulped down because she was thirsty. She went
to Paris and consulted a famous physician, begging
him to do something which would extract the worm-
wood from her body. He told her there was but one
remedy, and that was ox-gall. This he gave her by
the pound, and in a few weeks the wormwood was all
gone, but the ox-gall had taken its place, and was
fully as bitter and disagreeable. To get rid of the
ox-gall she was advised to take counsel of the Pope.
She accordingly went tp Rome and obtained an
audience of the Holy Father. He told her that
she must make a pilgrimage to the plain where
the pillar of salt stood, into which Lot’s wife was
transformed, and must eat a piece of the salt as
big as her thumb. During the journey in search of
the pillar of salt she endured many sufferings, but
finally triumphed over all obstacles, and after a good
deal of deliberation reasoned that, as she had a very
bad habit of sucking her thumb, it would be very
philosophical to break off this part from the statue,
and thus not only get cured of the bitterness in her
mouth, but also of her failing. She did so” — and
awoke to find that she had sucked all the aloes off
her thumb.^ But while such dreams with a presenta-
tive basis are well recognised and not uncommon, it
has been questioned whether there are representative
dreams of taste and smell; those who deny them
attributing the dream to an undetected prescntative

* W. A. Hammond, Treatise on Insanity^ p. 228.

262

SLEEP.

element. This question is related to what has been
called the “ affective memory,” and the possibility of
reviving such impressions without an objective basis
during waking life. Ribot, who has investigated this
point in sixty persons of varying class, age, and sex,
finds, somewhat to his own surprise, that in not less
than 60 per cent, of his subjects there was a distinct
and in many cases a very pronounced ability to revive,
voluntarily or involuntarily, familiar smells, such as
those of many flowers, carbolic acid, etc.^

As regards dreams. Professor Titchener has shown
that we must probably recognise representative taste-
dreams and Miss Plallam found that after special
precautions had been taken against objective tastes
by washing out the mouth before retiring, a dream
occurred involving taste-images (eating onions and
enjoying them, but thinking their odour disagreeable),
not real tastes.^

Common organic visceral sensation plays a large
part in dreams : fatigue, respiration, circulation,
hunger, thirst, and especially sexual desire and the
pressure of a full bladder, which is frequently trans-
formed into visions of rivers and lakes,^ bear easily
verifiable witness to this influence.

It is chiefly under the influence of functional or
organic disturbance that the heart or the respiration
produces dreams. Thus Max Simon relates that

Ribot, Psychologic des Sentiments, Ch. xi. (I{ng. ed.. Contemporary
Science Series, 1897, pp. up et seq.).

^ Am. Jour. Psych., vol. vi. pp. 507 et seq.

® Ibid., vol. vii. p. 406.

Weygandt, in his interesting little book, Entsiehung der Traiime,
records a number of dreams in which he found that this transformation
took place, and he also gives special attention to the influence of the
other organic sensations named.

MUSCULAR SENSATIONS IN DREAMS. 263

when at one period subject to nervous palpitation,
aggravated by the use of tobacco, he frequently
dreamed that he was pursued by enemies from
whom he could only escape after terrible adventures,
awaking to find his heart in violent action. In such a
case the excessive action of the heart is attributed by
sleeping consciousness to a physical cause — running
— and mental anxiety, which would also cause it
In another case mentioned by the same writer, a
respiratory trouble was referred by the dreamer to
another person or animal ; an asthmatic was wont
to dream that he saw sweating horses vainly en-
deavouring to draw enormous burdens uphill, awaking
to find that he was himself in a similar hot and op-
pressed state. '

Professor Hourly Void, of Christiania, whose re-
searches on dreams are now well known, has lately
devoted special attention to the part played by
cutaneous and muscular sensations in dreams. He
finds that the position of the limb in the dream
corresponds on the whole to its real position, the
other parts of the body being grouped in dreaming
consciousness as they would be if the actual position
of the limb occurred in waking life ; so that, for
instance, if the sole of the foot is curved, we dream
that we are standing on the points of our toes. In
the same way, if we dream of the limb being in
movement, such movement must include its actual
position, that is to say that in the same case of the
curved sole we dream of dancing or running, or other
movements requiring plantar flection.

It may happen that we transfer such position or
movement frem ourselves to another person, or to an
animal. Such a change of personality is in accord-

264

SLEEP.

ancc with the psychic facts of wakiii" life. The
sight of another person’s position or movement is
often accompanied by a muscular movement in the
obseivers body, and we also have a tendency to
explain by visual images what we experience by the
other senses ; so in dreams, dominated by fatigue,
u e explain oui muscular sensations by images of
other persons whom we suppose to be in the muscular
states that we ourselves are really in.

Sometimes the limb presents itself to the dreamer
as an animal or monstrosity having some resemblance
to itself. This phenomenon may be explained in the
same way as the dreams of changed personality just
mentioned. In other cases the limb perceived by
dream-consciousness gives rise to abstract thoughts
having some analogy to the limb; for instance, the
perception of fingers may cause dreams of objects in
some respects multiples of the fingers concerned, thus
involving a mental calculation during sleep. All
these dream phenomena may be accounted for by
an imperfect interpretation of the facts, due to a
fatigued consciousness.^

In this connection reference may be made to the
fact that there is a curious failure of connection
between the movements we make in sleep and the
movements that we attempt to make in dreams. An
English psychologist, Mr. F. H. Bradley, has dis-
cussed the causes of this failure of the dreaming
consciousness to impress movement, except in a
slight degree on the tongue, the fingers, etc. He
finds two reasons, though he regards these as incom-
plete: (i) “the comparative weakness of psychical states

^ J. Hourly Void, JagUa^eher ,om dromme, sarlig oin dromme af
lUuskuIar og optisck oprindehe, Cristiania, 1896.

EMOTION IN DREAMS.

265

in dreams;” as, however, he adds that emotional
states are strong in dreams, we can scarcely say that
motor ideas are weak ; (2) “ the vagueness of ideas
of active movement;” the position of the actual
body does not correspond with the position our
dream ideas assume it to be in ; hence there is
a lack of co-ordination.^ This lack of harmony
between the psychic world and the actual physical
world, as expressed in the position of the body, is no
doubt an important factor.

Emotion in Dreams. — The consideration of the
organic and visceral elements in dreams, and especially
of the muscular element, naturally leads us to the
large part played by emotion in dreams, for it is on
this basis that emotion develops. Emotion plays a
large part in dreams, but it is a fluctuating part, and
one not easy to estimate ; moreover, there are very
considerable individual differences. Miss Weed and
Miss Hallam investigated this point and found that
of the 381 dreams by six young women students
which they investigated, 29 per cent, were pleasant, 57
per cent, unpleasant, the unpleasant emotions occur-
ring in the following decreasing order of prominence :
perplexity and hurry, discomfort and helplessness,
fear, anger, disappointment, shame. A strong diver-
gence of individual experience was found. To two
of the subjects dreams are chiefly a source of plea-
sure ; one recorded half her dreams (72 out of 141) as
distinctly pleasant, though sometimes experiencing
vividly painful dreams. Another said, “ I look
forward with delight to my hours of sleep.” Again,
another said that she usually considered dreaming a

^ F. H. Bradley, “ On the Failure of Movement in Dream,” Mind,
July 1894.

266

SLEEP.

very pleasant experience, but that during this period
of dream-study the disagreeable predominated, which
suggests that possibly the subjective study of dream

phenomena brought about an abnormal emotional
disposition.^

Somewhat more recently Dr. Sante de Sanctis, of
Rome, has published the results of an elaborate
objective investigation into the relation between the
emotional content of dreams and that of the waking
state.2 He proposed to investigate two questions :
(i) whether the emotions of the waking state find an
echo in dreams; and (2) whether the emotions of
dreams find an echo in the waking state. For this
purpose he inquired into the dreams of 145 normal
men, 50 normal women, 60 imbeciles and idiots,
125 criminals, 43 prostitutes, and many hysterical,
epileptic, neurasthenic, hypochondriacal, and melan-
cholic subjects, also children, besides endeavouring
to make observations on animals.

With reference to the first question he divides his
subjects into four groups. In the first group there
was no constant relationship between the emotional
state when waking and the subsequent emotional
state when sleeping, although emotional dreams might
be liable to occur ; to this group belonged a third"" of
the normal men, including many of the aged, a fifth
of the normal women, more than two-thirds of the
idiots and imbeciles, most of the criminals, and many
prostitutes ; these subjects are mostly poor dreamers,
and some of them — for example, many idiots, many
criminals, and some prostitutes — do not dream at all.

^ Am. Jour. Psych., April 1896, pp. 408, 409.

2 Sante de Sanctis, “ Emozioni e Sogni,” Driiter IntertiatiouaJe
Congress f Ur Psychologie, Munich, 1897, pp. et seq.

EMOTION IN DREAMS.

267

In the second group of subjects the emotions are
sometimes repeated in sleep, sometimes not, such
repetition depending on the quality of the emotion ;
for instance, emotions of fear reappearing, and of joy
not ; or emotions of sexual character reappearing, of
sympathy not To this group belong one-seventh of
the normal men, one-fifth of the normal women, one-
fourth of the idiots and imbeciles, and most of the
criminals and prostitutes who dream. De Sanctis notes
that it is curious to observe how idiots, as may be seen
by observing them during sleep, always dream over
again a crisis of anger experienced during the day,
but never one of sexual emotion or of joy; while the
murderer does not dream over again the scene of the
crime accompanied by any notable emotion. In a
third group are included those subjects whose waking
emotions, retaining their fundamental quality, are
habitually repeated in dreams; more than one-third
of the normal men, and three-fifths of the normal
women, belong to this group, as well as many
hysterical and neurasthenic subjects. De Sanctis
remarks, in regard to this group, that certain dis-
tinctions must be made. The more acute emotions
of the waking state — those that are sudden and rapid
— are not easily echoed in dreams; while the chronic
emotions — the passions — are much more easily re-
presented, so that in those who are in love, the very
religious, the jealous, the hypochondriacal, etc., there
may be continuity between the waking and sleeping
emotional states. But in regard to intensity of
emotion, De Sanctis finds, like other observers, that
it is the waking emotions of medium intensity which
most readily reappear in sleep, while the very severe
emotions scarcely ever appear, or only at a later

268

SLEEP.

date. This he regards as one of the most certain and
important of his results. It does not hold good, how-
ever, to the same extent for children, among whom
the more frequent and intelligent dreamers easily
experience in sleep all the emotions they have gone
through when awake. In the fourth and last group
the waking emotions are re-echoed in dreams, but
with an inverted quality; that is to say that depressing
emotions are connected with exalted emotions, anger
with pity, and so on. These are the dreams of emotional
contrast already noted by Griesinger, Lombroso, and
others. A few normal women belong to this group,
and also some hysterical, hypochondriacal, and neura-
sthenic subjects; in normal men and in children the
phenomenon was not found.

In considering whether the emotions of sleep find
an echo in the waking state, De Sanctis distinguishes
two varieties of cases. In the first the emotion is
protracted directly into the waking state ; in the
second case it is merely repeated subsequently. It
was easy to find examples of emotion carried on
into the waking state among children, the hysterical,
young epileptics, and in a few normal (more especially
female) subjects. In such cases terrifying, mystical,
or erotic emotions arising in sleep were continued on
into the conscious life though with a varying degree
of duration and intensity. Such repercussion of the
emotions of sleep was found to be the rule in those
idiots and imbeciles who are capable of emotional
dreams, and is frequently found in minor cases of
hysteria, in the neurasthenic, etc. In criminals and
prostitutes it is rare; it is, however, sometimes marked
in the latter in the case of emotional exaltation, espe-
cially of religious or sexual character. The sexual

DREAMS A REVELATION OF CHARACTER. 269

emotions of dream life, especially in normal persons,
have an undoubted repercussion in waking life.^

In summarising his general conclusions, De Sanctis
remarks that the emotions of the waking state are not
repeated in the dreaming state when this is from any
cause reduced in activity. Further, it is a necessary
condition for such repetition that the waking emotions
shall be really and intimately felt; in this connection
De Sanctis refers to the close connection, as shown
by Lange, James, Sergi, and others, between emotion
and the muscular and vasomotor systems; emotion is
not a mere intellectual or simply reflex phenomenon.
“Thus dream life is a revelation of individual char-
acter.” But at the same time those waking emotions
which are too intense, in which there has been an ex-
cessive expenditure of force, and the katabolic phase
of the metabolic cycle has unduly predominated, are
only with great difficulty and after a long period
re-echoed in dreams. De Sanctis suggests that we
may account for this phenomenon on the ground that
the anabolic phase of repair and organic synthesis
hinders such repetition ; the emotion is, as it were,
too fatigued to repeat itself. And in exceptional
cases a complementary emotion appears, the anti-
thesis of the waking emotion, having the same signifi-
cance as complementary colour-images, and indicating

^ Elsewhere {I Sogni e il Sonno, p. 92), De Sanctis, remarking that
in various normal subjects, as well as sometimes in hysteria, he has
found that sexual emotions in dreams are prolonged into waking life,
refers to two of his hysterical subjects (a young man and a young
woman), who whenever they experienced an erotic dream in connection
with any person, on awaking continued to feel sexual attraction towards
that person. That the dream was the origin and not the result of this
emotion was shown by the fact that the person who excited this attrac-
tion might be wholly unattractive by age or appearance, and was some-
times even of the same sex.

270

SLEEP,

a marked phase of anabolic activity. The facts
altogether authorise us to conclude that there is
as Ribot has argued, a real emotional memory
distinct from the intellectual memory.

These observations, as well as my own and others
a ready ^ referred to, show us how sleep is the
resting-time of consciousness. Consciousness sleeps
and that is why we forget our pains, our sorrows’
even our transgressions. It is thus also that, in th6
partial awakening of consciousness, when we dream
we do not see what has irritated and excited us in
the waking state, we do not see what has plunged us
into despair or grief. In the same way we do not see
what caused us joy and gladness. It is all clearly
due to the very simple law that the functions and
tissues which have been most energetically active
during the waking state fall into the deepest repose
during ^ sleep. The ideas and feelings of grief
and misfortune on which the waking man may
concentrate his whole attention become in sleep as
though they no longer existed. And not only, if we
chance to encounter some overwhelming misfortune
m our lives, do we forget it during sleep ; even on
awaking we do not at once recall it, we only feci
something unpleasant, heavy, painful, weighing upon
us; in what it consists we cannot at first recall. It
needs a certain time and effort to remember the
sorrow or misfortune which has spread its burden

over the whole of life, and is only forgotten durino-
sleep. ^

Evidently this antagonism between the sleeping
psychic life and the waking psychic life preserves the
human organism from many diseases by tending to
remove the possibility of over-tension of the vartous

DREAMS AND INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT. 27 1

parts of the brain. It is evident, also, that when
grief or anxiety leads to insomnia a serious mental
or nervous disease may ensue. When, therefore,
normal sleep disappears as a result of grief, it is
prudent to obtain some hours of repose even with the
aid of hypnotics.

Kant was certainly right when he said that without
sleep and without hope man would be the most
unhappy creature in the world. Sleep is the reality
of that Lethe which, the old Greek thought, existed
beyond the grave. But if we need forgetfulness
anywhere it is certainly on the earth and not else-
where.

After all that has been said concerning the direct and
indirect origin of dreams in the subjective life of the
neuro-cerebral apparatus, it seems to follow that this
should appear the more rich and varied the greater
the individual development of the subject. Observa-
tions which I have made during five years on thirty-
seven persons of varying age and intelligence give
the following results: (i) the number of dreams is
less in persons of little intellectual development, while
in persons of more active cerebral life dreams are
numerous and varied ; (2) the more uncultured and
confined a man’s mind is the more his dreams are
marked by their illogical, uncouth, and rudimentary
character, and the more they are limited to the
repetition of what the subject really experienced
during the previous days. This latter tendency
was observed in 80 per cent of the cases, while
in the more intelligent subjects the dreams were
never limited to a repetition of v/hat had been lived
through in the waking state, but, on the contrary,
tended to introduce a less familiar background on

2 72

SLEEP.

which unknown scenes were played. Only in a
limited number of dreams of intellectual persons was
it possible to trace the appearance of familiar faces
objects or scenery, and when such dreams were added
to those in which echoes of real life and its cares and
anxieties reappeared they only amounted to 15 per
cent, cases. In explaining this greater number,
variety, and originality of dreams in intelligent sub-
jects, I must recall what has already been said at
length regarding the essential or subjective life of the
nervous system and brain. It is easy to understand
that this subjective life must necessarily be richer and
more varied, the more varied and numerous are the
traces left by sensations, emotions and thoughts,
such accumulated traces forming the material out
of which dreams are constituted ; and it is superior
education and development alone which can enrich
this subjective life. Thus it may be said that while
the intellectual man’s dreams tend to reproduce his
personal development, the uncultured man’s dreams
tend rather to reproduce his racial development —
that is to say, the general capacities of the neuro-
cerebral system he has inherited from his ancestors, —
while on account of the poverty of his psychic world
his dreams necessarily retrace the facts which have
lately occupied his waking life. In more highly
developed persons the wealth of varied neuro-
cerebral material makes possible not only a resusci-
tation of forgotten emotions and ideas, but also
permits the formation of new combinations, and the
creation of images which have never existed.

It must not be forgotten, however, that we each
of us represent, in a certain sense, the sum of the
characters of our parents and remote ancestors ; and

FREQUENCY OF DREAMING. 2/3

consequently we all may reproduce in our dreams the
preceding stages, not only of personal, but also of
racial development. From this point of view the
study of dreams may furnish important indications
in clearing up different psychological questions.

To bring out clearly the connection between fre-
quency of dreams and intellectual development, I
may refer further to the results of my own inquiries as
to frequency of dreaming. In persons occupied with
intellectual work (professors, writers, scientific men},
and in good health, the number of nights in the
month without dreams oscillated between three and
ten ; any source of exhaustion would increase this
number even up to twenty. On the other hand, in
subjects belonging to the lower classes of society
(cooks, servant girls, dressmakers, coachmen, soldiers,
etc.) dreams were generally absent from eight to
twenty-five nights during the month, varying with
the individual. In short, dreams increase with the
variety and activity of the intellectual life.

Since sleep is the resting-time of consciousness, a
very deep sleep does not permit of dreams, while a very
light sleep is usually accompanied by many dreams.
Goblot has even insisted that dreams are the result
of awaking. Patrick and Gilbert, in the course of
the important experiments on the influence of pro-
longed abstinence from sleep already summarised in
Chapter I., made experiments on dreaming by allow-
• ing the subject to fall asleep for periods of half a
minute, one minute, three minutes, etc., and then
awaking them and asking them for their dreams.
No dream was obtained in any case, though if the
period were less than a minute, there was a hazy
dream-like memory which could not be put into

274

SLEEP.

words. “ These rough experiments,” they conclude
“confirm the generally accepted opinion that dreams
are the product of light sleep, representing, indeed,
the reinstatement of consciousness after the early and
profound sleep.” It is not surprising, therefore, that
those who dream much have a more marked tendency
to sleep than those who dream but seldom (F.
Heerwagen), for their distinct and numerous dreams
disturb the tranquillity of consciousness; consequently
a greater amount of repose is necessary, and sleep is
prolonged.

Basing my conclusions on observations which I
carried on for five years on thirty-seven subjects, I
found that in the majority of cases dreams decrease
in number as old age comes on ; it is the young
who dream most, and subjective visual images are
also rarer in old age. Moreover, I found that that
which interests us most during waking life, and
chiefly absorbs our waking attention, seldom makes
up the texture of our dreams during the period
immediately following the deaths of those whom we
love we see them alive and well, and only at a later
period, when grief is becoming appeased and dissi-
pated by time, do they appear otherwise. Haemor-
rhages, and diseases which exhaust the organism, as
well as all depressing emotions, tend to diminish the
number of dreams. In the same way, according to
Johannes Muller, subjective visual images are specially
clear and frequent in good health and tranquillity.
I found that conversation, phrases, and separate words
only occurred in 8.5 per cent, of the dreams examined,
grouping together those in which either the subject

1 This, as mentioned on p. 257, has already been pointed out by
Delage and Miss Calkins, and is confirmed by De Sanctis.

VERBAL DREAMS.

275

or interlocutors spoke distinguishing the words
pronounced by the subject from those spoken by
others, the latter were found to form only i per cent.,
while visual images form 85 per cent. There is a
well-known tendency in dreams, as was long since
pointed out by Maury, for the perpetration of bad
puns, sound leading sense, as happens frequently
with the insane, idiots, and children. In this respect,
also, we thus see an analogy between the sleeping
state and enfeebled conditions of the waking state of
consciousness.

It is not superfluous to remark here that in our
dreams we scarcely ever see our own faces; if this
happens it is usually due to gazing in a mirror on the
previous evening; so that beautiful women, who in-
dulge long in such contemplation, ought to see them-
selves in dreams much more frequently than ordinary
mortals. The same is true of hallucinations; deitero-
scopy, or hallucinations in which one sees oneself, are
very rare.^ It is true that Goethe once had such a
hallucination in full daylight in the open country, but
there is reason to suppose that in youth he was some-
what preoccupied with his own person.

It may be asked what difference there is between
the psychic activity of sleep and the conscious psychic

1 This proportion of dreams with a verbal element may be abnor-
mally small. Miss Calkins found that for one of her two subjects
(male) the dreams in which words occurred were 77 out of 147 ; while
in the other subject (female) the proportion was still larger, no out of
165. {Am. Journ. Psych., April 1893, p. 322.)

“ Thus the Psychical Society’s Census of Hallucinations only con-
tained seven such cases out of a total of nearly 1,300 visual hallucina-
tions, and the only example quoted in detail in the report is that in
which a young lady of twenty-four, in robust health, saw her own
“double” approach with “a charming smile.”

276

SLEEP.

activity of waking life. Is there a difference, and if
so, will it enable us to elucidate some of the obscure
points in psychic life? In dreams we are often the
mere spectators of images and scenes which unroll
before us, and it is but rarely that our own personality,
the “ego,” intervenes. We all accomplish acts in
dreams, and experience feelings, which are in com-
plete contradiction with our deepest convictions and
incompatible with our character. Good and gentle
persons may be transformed in dreams into murderers
and rascals. Why? It seems that in this drowsy
state of consciousness the personal qualities of the
man are gradually effaced, to give place to the activity
of a neuro-cerebral system inherited from more or less
ancient ancestors with all the representations, feelings,
thoughts, and acts corresponding to that activity.^
In dreams we live over again, as it were, what
our ancestors felt and thought. I might quote the
dream described by Pierre Loti in his Livre de la
Pitie et de la Mort, but every one, on reflection, may
discover analogous dreams in his personal life during
sleep. In general, as Spiess and many later writers
have pointed out, we have in dreams little or no notion
of our own personality. Such vagueness and confusion
in the notion of personality is always associated with
undeveloped states of consciousness. Thus children,
whose consciousness in the early years of life is still
weak and undeveloped, cannot understand the sig-
nificance of the pronoun “ I ” ; instead of saying “ I ”
they use more difficult words, for instance, their own
Christian names, and speak of themselves in the third

^ At the same time we may also invoke these contrast phenomena
which are a well-recognised factor of the dreaming life, and which have
already been mentioned (p. 268).

PERSONALITY IN DREAMS.

2/7

person. The same phenomenon is observed in idiots
(Broussais), and in certain forms of insanity. Every
enfeeblement or abolition of consciousness in man in-
volves the enfeeblement or abolition of the personal ego.
Thus whenever the clear idea of one’s own personality
intrudes into a dream, it is an indication of a marked
awakening of consciousness. In fairly deep sleep
conscious personality is abolished, and the images of
dreams pass before -us strange and unknown, without
relation to us. We can scarcely recall dreams of this
kind, and if we sometimes remember them, it is later
on, sometimes in the course of the day. Such re-
miniscence of dreams occurs in accordance with the
psycho-physiological law (already referred to in
another connection), by which we sometimes hear,
afterwards, the sounds of - human speech which
have ceased, the melody which no longer vibrates,
the clock which struck some seconds since; they had
passed unperceived, though not unregistered, because
then consciousness was otherwise occupied. The
neuro-cerebral system retains the traces of the im-
pressions which strike it, and in the absence of other
exterior impressions, these may revive under the sole
influence of that voluntary impulsion which is, as it
were, given by consciousness. In such cases con-
sciousness may be compared to a master who returns
to his property after a temporary absence ; he carefully
examines all the changes, the additions, the trans-
, positions which have occurred during his absence, and
notes what he finds.

I have already insisted on the large part taken in

the constitution of dreams by the traces left by

sensation in the brain and nerves. If we look at-
tentively at an object and then close the eyes, we

2;8

SLEEP.

still see it, sometimes clothed in the same colours as
in reality, as a positive image, sometimes in comple-
mentary colours — the light turned to dark and the
dark to light — as a negative image; and we have all
in childhood tried to look at the sun and remember
the coloured negative images which floated before us
afterwards. Mourly Void has shown, as we have
seen (p. 258), how these positive and negative images
can be experimentally obtained in dreams. We have
still to ask whether the images of dreams produce
a corresponding reflection in waking life. Dream
emotions, already referred to (p. 268), produce
an echo in waking life. Is it the same with dream-
images ?

It sometimes happens in the waking state that
subjective impressions leave positive and negative
images. Thus Fdre has stated that he is able to
visualise, for example, a red cross so vividly that
it is followed by a negative image showing the com-
plementary greenish colour. Meyer, also, states that
with closed eyes he evoked in the middle of the
dark visual field the image of a silver stirrup, and on
opening his eyes continued to see before him the
same image, only dark instead of light. He observed
similar phenomena after dream-images. Thus he
dreamed that he was walking on the edge of a
dark canal when he was suddenly attacked by a
light yellow little dog that barked and tried to bite
him. The dreamer awoke in fear, and on opening his
eyes continued to see the dog-image of his dream,
except that its colour was dark instead of light^
Burdach tells us in his Physiology that he dreamed
that his daughter, who had recently died, was taken

^ H. Meyer, Physiologic der Nerven/asern, pp. 239 el seq.

279

THE AFTER-IMAGES OF DREAMS.

up into heaven, and on awakening continued to see
with open eyes his daughter’s form rising in the air.
Griiithuisen dreamed that he saw lightning, and on
awakening he actually saw a feeble luminous line which
then gave place to a sensation of special blackness.
On another occasion he dreamed that he was looking
for a book on the shelves of a library ; he then awoke,
and before his open eyes the backs of the volumes
continued to pass from left to right.^ A similar case
has been recorded by Strumpell of a lady who dreamed
that a coffin was in her room, and that a mass of blue
flowers was lying on it; awaking at the moment she
continued to see both coffin and flowers.

It has happened to me on several occasions to see
with open eyes, on awakening, the images of my
dreams; and under such circumstances I have observed
that the chief condition for preserving the dream-
image on awakening is to avoid changing the direc-
tion in which the eyes are turned. It thus appears
that we may continue to see the image we saw in
dream if we awake at the moment of a distinct and
vivid dream, and if this awakening is produced
without shock or movement, the e>’es retaining the
direction that they had in sleep when gazing at the
image. Consequently the cases in which one may
best see the dream-image on awakening are those in
which the dreamer is aroused by the influence of the
dream itself, and on awakening is neither deafened by
noise nor dazzled by light, so that on opening his
eyes he naturally remains in the same position uhxh
he occupied during the interrupted dream. The
slightest movement of the head or eyes immediately
dissipates the image.

* Gruilhuisen, Beilrdge zur Fhysiognosie^ pp. 232 el seq.

SLEEl’.

280

^ Studying the traces loft by dreams, I have con-
vinced myself that not only are the colours seen in
dreams modified on awakening according to the laws
o contrast, but that the same change is observed in
the entire character of the dream-figure. Thus a face
which seen in dream wears an expression of sadness
or reproach, if still seen with open eyes on awakening
sometimes seems joyous or smiling. It is evident
that this change represents the formation of a nega-
tive image, though purely psychic, the given expres-
Sion or emotion being replaced, according to the law
of contrast, by the opposed and as it were comple-
mentary emotion.^ Thus just as the emotions of the
day may find their complementary emotions in sleep
so the emotions of the night may find their comple’
mentary images on awakening.

Those dreams which, as it were, cross the boundary
which separates the world of dreams from the world
of waking life usually produce a very strong impres-
sion, for we do not like to find ourselves face to face
with the independent creations of our neuro-cerebral
system, not fully realising the subjective life of the
nerves and brain -cells, and when brought into the
presence of the creations of this subjective life we are
liable to be terrified as well as surprised. I shall
myself never forget the impression produced by a
dream of the image of Christ, crowned with thorns,
which befell me when seriously ill. The face of Jesus
was admirably reproduced, and full of sweet and
piofound sadness; but suddenly the expression began
to change, and in my dream I was so astonished that
a mere painted image could thus change its physi-
ognomy that I awoke, and yet still continued to see
the divine face before me with an expression of sad-

ASSOCIATION IN DREAMS.

2S1

ness on it, slowly changing into a mild and joyous
smile which at last completely effaced its earlier
melancholy. In this case awakening took place in
the morning when it was quite light. Another dream
which vividly impressed me happened in the autumn
of 1894. I imagined that the bell rang, that the front
door was opened by the servant, and that some one
noisily entered, then that my study door opened, and
that the imperial . Russian standard was brought
to me as I sat in an easy-chair. It was inclined
towards me, and I distinctly saw the two large golden
tassels hanging from the staff while the flag floated
down unfurled, so that the two-headed eagle could be
plainly seen, as well as the three national colours,
white, yellow, and black. The appearance of the
national flag in my house surprised me so much that
I awoke, and on opening my eyes still saw it before
me* with the three national colours, the eagle, and the
two golden tassels, while the staff was slightly bent
towards me. In this case the after-image was positive,
and the vision disappeared without change of colours.
It was still night, and the bedroom was in absolute
darkness.

The preceding facts are, I imagine, enough to show
that dream-images leave more or less profound traces
in the neuro-cerebral system, and that consciousness,
as we awake, may from these traces reconstitute our
dreams. This labour of consciousness is considerably
. facilitated by the law of association, by virtue of which
all the sensations and ideas grouped in time and space
possess a tendency to reciprocal reproduction when
any one of them reappears. Thus the reminiscence,
or rather posterior consciousness, of dreams is pos-
sible, because the subjective activity of the neuro-

282

SLEEP.

cerebral apparatus leaves traces in its turn, traces
which may revive according to the laws of association
and under the influence of concentrated attention.
We have seen, moreover, that the notion of the
is more or less enfeebled during sleep, and that this
enfeeblement may even go as far as complete anni-
hilation.

Cause and Effect in Dreaming. — One of the char-
acteristics of the psychic life of sleep is that attention
ceases to be voluntary and becomes purely reflex;
that is to say, it attaches itself to the strongest idea or
sensation. In this respect the sleeping man resembles
the child, the savage, or the idiot, in whom attention
seems also to be reflex and inaccessible to the im-
pulsion of will. All that we see in dreams is sub-
mitted to us under the fundamental conditions of
time and space, but the third fundamental law of
psychic life, which naturally obliges us to find a
sufficient cause for each act and phenomenon, is
almost completely absent from the psychic life of
sleep. In dreams we observe a certain succession
in time and space, but we seldom note the relation
of cause and effect.

The reason of this is simple: this law of cause
is, as Helmholtz justly points out, a purely logical
law of thought, and therefore it is impossible except
when consciousness is active. In the preceding
chapter I have pointed out that many people
pass their lives in a sort of perpetual half-sleeping
state due to enfeebled consciousness, and in such
persons also we find a similarly enfeebled notion of
causality. Folk-lore shows how feebly cause and
effect have been understood in the past and are still
among the less intelligent classes and races. The

CAUSE AND EFFECT IN DREAMS. 283

liomo0opa.thic rule, siuiilid siuiiltbus cuvciniuv^ is not
a recent discovery. In old days medicines were
generally given according to their resemblance to
the disease, though this resemblance was then sought
exclusively in external qualities, and not in the action
of the medicine. Thus the hearts of carrots were ad-
ministered in jaundice, the colour being that presented
by the patient suffering from the disease; for heart
disease the fruits . of limocarpiis anacardium were
prescribed from their exterior resemblance to the
human heart; for kidney disease, seeds which re-
sembled the kidneys, and so on (Fraser).

The error that the remedy must resemble the
disease in order to effect a cure seems to me in-
spired by the same tendency which compels us
during sleep, and during enfeebled states of con-
sciousness generally, to associate everything which
presents some common resemblance, for example,
words according to their sound, ^ and images ac-
cording to some accidental and external resem-
blance. The same tendency is also observed in
the uneducated, and very markedly in the insane.^
A number of popular superstitions rest on an
accidental resemblance. For instance, in Russia
many people believe that to light three candles on
a table is a bad omen, presaging a death in the house.
This superstition is explained when we remark that
in Russia it is the custom to place three candles
around a dead body, one at each side of the head
and one at the feet.

* Thus Maury recorded a dream which was connected by the words,
pileriuagey Pelletier, pelle; another by the words, Chardin, jardin,
Janin; and another was thus bound together, kilometre, kilos, Gilolo,
lobilia, Lopez, loto.

See, for instance, Lombroso, The Man of Genius, pp. 176 et seq.

284

SLEEP.

in dreams and hallucinations we may find still
more unexpected approximations; any resemblance
in colour or form is enough to associate images which
are altogether heterogeneous.

The absence of causality in dreams explains also
the well-known fact that we are not easily surprised
in dreams (Spitta, Winter); and in so far as conscious
thought and logic are absent, astonishment is im-
possible; for it can only appear when a phenomenon
is in direct contradiction with all the laws of logical
thought.1

For the same reason children and the uneducated
show extreme credulity ; they accept every absurdity
because they are unable to ascertain whether or not
the phenomenon in question is in accordance with
the logical conditions of thought An accidental
resemblance suffices to associate incompatible things;
the simple succession of the most heterogeneous
phenomena leads to a supposed relation of cause
and effect. It is to this same mental level that we
are all reduced in dreams. It may be remarked also
that children, the aged, and even adults when en-
feebled by disease, cannot always distinguish dream
life from real life. It was thus with Caspar Hauser,
who at seventeen or eighteen was on the same
mental level as a child, and during the first years of
his life among men was, it is said, unable to dis-

^ It is important to point out, however, that it is quite incorrect to
assert, as Spitta and others have asserted, that no surprise at all is felt in
dreams. As Miss Calkins justly remarks, we may experience surprise,
but it is soon lulled by the vividness of the impression. We have to
recognise “the possibility of dream-thought active enough to explain
dream-images, but not keen enough to deny their externality.” Having
accepted the dream-image, we are capable of reflecting on it very
reasonably.

DREAMING AND INSANITY. 285

tinguish real life from his dreams, which he regarded
as actual events.

In this connection, also, I may refer to the dreams
in which the chief part is played, not by images, but
by speech. As was remarked more than fifty years
ago by Philip, the words we utter in dreams are
never so absurd as the visions that appear to us.
This is natural when we remember that speech is the
chief instrument of logical thought. In dream dis-
cussions— which for some authors constitute a direct
proof of the duality of the brain— our opponent often
corrects our own mistakes and brings forward more
coeent arguments than we have been able to advance.

Dreaming and Insanity. — We have already seen
that on awakening from a deep sleep we often see
the images which formed part of our dreams, just as
also we may see in dreams the images which floated
before our eyes before falling asleep. And we are
entitled to conclude that dreams and hallucinations
are at bottom phenomena having the same origin.

It is not therefore surprising that the images of
dreams, and dreams themselves, may be transformed
into hallucinations, and that it has long been known
that there is a distinct relation between dreaming
and insanity. Dreaming may, as Wundt puts it,
be called a “normal temporary insanity.” ^ Diderot
often insisted upon this connection. In the last
century a Geneva physician recorded the case of a
• young lady who dreamed that her step-mother was
approaching with a dagger to kill her, and was so
deeply impressed that she thus became the victim

^ Cabanis {Rapports dn physique et du moral, Paris, 1824, t. ii. p.
359) gives Cullen the credit of being the first to point out the similarity
between the phenomena of dreaming and those of delirium.

286

SLEEP.

of a delusion which rendered her insane. As Wright
has lately shown also, the insanity of the poet Cowper
to some extent owed its character to a dream. Falret,
Moreau of Tours, and Brierre de Boismont have all
described hallucinations that began in sleep and were
finally accepted. F^r6 gives a case of hysterical
paralysis following a dream.i

In all such cases the process is similar; first there
is a vivid or often-repeated dream; then this dream
attains a despotic empire over the subject’s attention;
and he is at last dominated by the images or ideas
engendered by the dream. I may quote the following
case : A young man of twenty-two was driving out
with his wife when by chance a child fell down before
the carriage and a wheel passed over it, crushing the
head; the young man was seized with horror, and the
same night he started up in his sleep exclaiming,
“ Save the child ! save the child ! '* This was repeated
every night, sometimes several times during the night,
with piercing shrieks. It was always very difificult to
awaken him, and when awakened he could remember
nothing. He told his wife, however, that he was
tortured by frightful dreams, and that the image of
the injured child never left him. This went on for
two years, when epileptic attacks began to appear
and he rapidly fell into a state of complete dementia.
In another case a young man began to be tormented
during his sleep by dreams in which he imagined he
was being strangled. He thought his comrades were

^ F^re, “ A Contribution to the Pathology of Dreams,” Brain, vol.
ix. (1887), p. 488; also Fathologie des Emotions, p. 153; Faure,
“ Etudes sur les reves morbides,” Arch. Gin. de Med., May 1876;
Richter, Arch. f. Psych., xiii. i; Ph. Chaslin, Du rile du rive dans
revolution du dilire, 1887.

DREAMING AND INSANITY.

287

playing tricks on him. To prove that it was not so
they induced him to sleep alone and lock the door.
The dreams continued, and then he came to the
conclusion that he was tormented by the Devil — to
whom we so often attribute our misfortunes and
errors. Finally he became insane. Persons thus
obsessed by dreams are usually with difficulty
awakened, and often have a tendency to fall into
an intermediate state between waking and sleeping.
They thus possess at the outset a feeble and inactive
consciousness which needs strong impressions from
the external world to enable it to distinguish the
subjective from the objective. In the absence of such
strong impressions these persons are liable to regard
their own sensations as real and external.

In the same way, during the delirium of fever it
may happen that the patient’s consciousness is so
enfeebled by disease that he becomes delirious as
soon as he closes his eyes or as soon as the room
is darkened, while the delirium ceases when the eyes
are opened or the room is lit up. The same pheno-
menon has been observed in healthy subjects with
reference to hypnagogic hallucinations. Thus Maury
observed a servant girl who was obliged always to go
to sleep with a lighted candle in her room, for she
found that the light drove away the horrible and
grimacing faces which regularly tormented her in
darkness ; and Brach, who was himself subject to
hypnagogic hallucinations of general sensation and of
touch — imagining as he fell asleep that his body was
indefinitely large and heavy, extending towards the
stars, and then that it was shrivelling up to a point —
found that a lighted candle was sufficient to dissipate
all his false sensations ; so that we are justified in

288

SLEER

believing that light may influence not only appari-
tions, but also hallucinations of the other senses.

All the sensory impressions from the environment
have, however, a salutary effect even in insanity, and
Baillarger has observed that the hallucinations of the
inmates of asylums often disappear under any influ-
ence which interrupts, the monotony of their lives.
In this way hallucinations often cease during the
doctor’s visit. Trelat has recorded, also, that when
two hundred insane persons had on one occasion to
be removed from the Salpetriere and Bicetre to other
asylums, they were all provided with new clothes, and
this, together with the preparations for departure,
interested them so greatly that they forgot their
morbid hallucinations and delusions ; so strong was
the impression that even attacks of mania which had
been occurring periodically for from ten to fifteen
years, and fell due at this time, failed to manifest
themselves.

It has been observed even in completely normal
subjects, who on account of eye disease have been
placed in a dark room with bandaged eyes, that a
kind of delirium may appear. Schmidt-Rimpler, who
points this out, remarks, however, that it appears
exclusively in persons belonging to the lowest social
classes or in the very aged; that is to say, in those
only whose consciousness is weak or enfeebled. Such
delirium, due to sudden removal from the ordinary
luminous excitations which normally stimulate the
brain, was always violent, and the patient sometimes
forgot where he was and what was happening. But
as soon as the bandage was removed and the patient
brought into the light the delirium vanished, not to
appear again.

DREAMING AND DELIRIUM TREMENS, 289

It may be added that since the subjective life of
the neuro-cerebral system is also connected with the
circulation, it sometimes happens that hypnagogic
images, hallucinations, and delirium generally may
depend to some extent on the position of the body;
Pinel described a case in which auditory hallucina-
tions appeared as soon as the patient lay down and
disappeared as soon as she rose, and Schroder van
der Kolk found that in some cases delirium came on
as soon as the patient’s head was lowered.

Dreaming and Alcoholic Insanity. — The analogy
between dreaming and insanity may be easily under-
stood after all that has been said concerning the
resemblance among all states of enfeebled conscious-
ness, and it is not necessary to insist upon it.
Something may, however, bo said about one form of
delitium — the delirium tremens produced by alcohol —
which appears to have a specially close relationship
to dreaming. This was first pointed out by Lasegue.'^
He remarked that in the delirium of alcohol visual
hallucinations predominate, that these are varied
and incessant, constantly changing into new fantastic
shapes as the figures in a kaleidoscope, and singularly
resembling a dream. But the chief point in Lasegue’s
argument was that, unlike the sleep of ordinary
insanity, from which the prevailing delusion is mostly
absent, the sleep of the alcoholic subject is crowded
with similar images, and, moreover, that these are
really the constant and regular starting-point of the
disorder. Lasegue distinguished three periods in the
evolution of the delirium : the first, in which it only

^ Lasegue, “ Le Delire Alcoolique n’est pas un delire mais un reve,”
Arch, Ghi. de Mtd., Nov. 1881. Fere has also shown ihe analogy,
“ La Medecine d’lmagination,” Progrh Medical, 1886.

290

SLEEP.

appears at night, during sleep; the second period, in
which the patient is delirious awake as well as asleep,
the images and ideas being the same whether awake
or asleep; and a third stage, during which the
delirium passes into a confused sleepy condition
which usually goes on to convalescence. He con-
sidered the whole process as a pathological sleep.
His position was no doubt somewhat excessive, for
if we accepted it we should probably have to include
all forms of insanity under the same heading,

Latel}^, however, some interesting fresh light has
been thrown on the subject. The visual hallucina-
tions of alcoholic subjects, as is well known, are
extremely varied. Rats, mice, spiders, beetles, fleas
are very common and almost characteristic, while
flames and blood are very frequent;^ most frequent
of all, however, are probably visions of snakes and
worms.^ These have often been attributed to musc(B
volitantes in the eyes. Dr. Davis, however, has been
investigating the subject in the alcoholic wards of
Bellevue Hospital, New York, with the ophthalmo-
scope, and has brought out some interesting facts.
In every one of the sixteen cases examined, the
blood-vessels of the retina were found to be abnormal.
Instead of being pale and almost invisible, as in their

^ See, for instance, Magnan, Alude sur V Alcoolisme, 1S71.

2 De Sanctis has found that visions of small animals (microzooscopic
visions) are most frequent in alcoholic cases, those of large animals
(macrozooscopic) in hysterical cases, and makes the following remarks:—
“ Macrozooscopic dreams appeared in 62 per cent, of dreams belonging
to the group of severe hysteria, and in 35 per cent, of the group of
slight hysteria. In the alcoholic cases I have studied I have found, on
the other hand, that microzooscopic dreams constantly prevailed. Such
zooscopic visions in general occur, according to Liepmann, in 70 per cent,
of the alcoholic; Delasiauve only observed them in a fifth of his cases,
and Nacke in a third of his.” — De Sanctis, / Sogni e zl Somzo, p. 184.

VISIONS OF SNAKES.

291

ordinary condition, they were dark, almost black, with
congested blood. The blood-vessels of the retina,
which are .small and semi-transparent in health,
assume such a prominence that they are projected
into the field of vision, and their movements seem
like the twisting of snakes. Of course, with a brain
half paralysed or partially excited, the active circu-
latory condition of the fundus of the eye may assume
to the diseased imagination almost any form.^

It thus seems probable that alcoholic delirium has
its rise in an exaggerated and pathological form of pre-
cisely those subjective activities of the organs of sight
which, as we have already seen, play so large a part
in the causation both of hypnagogic phenomena and
dreams. At the same time it is probable, as Dr. F. W.
Brown has suggested, that similar subjective sensations
arising from a pathological state of the other sensory
organs may also play a part in giving shape to the
hallucinations of alcoholic delirium. Bugs, ants, mice,
and rats are common hallucinations, but they are
generally found first on the body and then afterwards
in the room and on the furniture. The appearance
first on the body can be explained on the supposition
that the hallucination was created by a cutaneous
sensation of itching, which would quickly lead,
through imperfect cognition, to the conception of a
bug or an ant, and then be secondarily manifested
as a visual hallucination. The primary hallucination
. of snakes could thus be brought about through mis-
interpretation of a ctitis anserina, or goose-flesh,
which sweeps coldly, wave-like, and rhythmically
over a portion of the body. The sensations pro-
ceeding from the skin would thus help to give shape
1 New York Medical Times, 1896.

292

SLEEP.

to the visual sensations arising from the congested
vessels of the retina.^

Morbid Dreams. — Pathological dreams were long
since divided by Macario^ into three groups: pro-
dromic dreams, which precede disease; symptomatic
dreams, which occur in the course of disease; and
essential morbid dreams, in which the dream con-
stitutes the main feature of the disease.

To illustrate prodromic dreams I will quote a few
examples. A man who had spent some time in
Egypt, and there suffered severely from inflammation

^ It may be added that other explanations of this phenomenon have
been offered. Thus Dr. F. W. Mann considers that there may be an
atavistic element, and asks: “ May not the explanation lie in the facts
of nascent consciousness ? We know that stimuli cannot be co-ordinated
without some ganglion through which they are brought into relation.
In effecting this co-ordination the ganglion must necessarily be subject
to the influences of each stimulus and must undergo a succession of
changes. This action and its reaction, implying perpetual experiences
of resemblances and differences, constitutes, according to psychologists,
the raw material of consciousness. Therefore, as a corollary of this
process, Herbert Spencer asserts that ‘ as consciousness is developed
some kind of instinct becomes nascent.’ That there is a nascent in-
stinctive dread of the serpent in man and monkey is obvious. There is
every reason for it. The early history of our race abounds with record
and tradition of that internecine strife between man and the serpent.
We find the serpent permeating all his mythology, a chief feature of his
legends, inscribed on his monuments, engraved on his symbols, and
worshipped as his god. Even before this period the dread of the
serpent may have been implanted in our human neuroplasm. Dr. A.
E. Brown recently made some experiments in the Philadelphia Zoo-
logical Gardens, and found that monkeys who, born and reared within
the gardens, had never seen a reptile, yet exhibited great fear and
curiosity when a snake was placed in their cage. An alligator or turtle
caused no surprise whatever. Other animals like the ox and the hog
were either perfectly indifferent, or manifested no fear of the snake.”

2 Du Somtfieil, etc., 1857, pp. 86 et seq. Macario was probably the
first writer to deal with this subject from a scientific standpoint.
It has been fully dealt with also by W. A. Hammond, A Treatise on
Insanity, 1883, pp. 234-261.

PREMONITORY DREAMS.

293

of the eyes, some ten years later, after he had long
been living in another country, began to dream nearly
every night of different places in Egypt and scenes of
his old life in that country. He was absolutely unable
to explain the strange frequency of these Egyptian
dreams, which continued persistently. At last in-
flammation of the eyes showed itself and served to
explain the dreams. It was evident that for some
time the premonitory symptoms of the disease had
existed, although unperceived in the waking state,
and hence by force of association the sensation of
discomfort from the eyes produced dream-images of
the old life in Egypt, where the previous attack of
inflammation had taken place. Again, a man
dreamed that he was bitten in the leg by a mad
dog; on awaking he felt -nothing; later, an ulcer
appeared on the spot where he dreamed he had
been bitten. Macario dreamed that he had a severe
pain in his throat; on awaking he felt well, but
a few hours subsequently was attacked by a severe
quinsy. M. Terte, a minister of justice under Louis
Philippe, dreamed that he had an attack of apoplexy;
three days later he died suddenly of that disease.
In other cases persons have dreamed of deafening
tempests, or of becoming dumb, and on awaking
have found that they actually are deaf or dumb.
Insane obsessions are sometimes preceded by such
dreams; thus Hack Tuke records the case of a
gentleman who dreamed that he committed a
criminal offence and was arrested; he awoke, relieved
to find it was only a dream, but a few days later he
became insane and actually committed the offence in
question.^ •

^ Tuke, art. “Dreaming,” Diet, of Psych, Med,

294

SLEEP.

All such dreams may be simply explained by the
fact that during sleep dreaming activity surrounds
with appropriate images the changes which are
developing in the sleeping man’s consciousness, and
which are caused by the pathological process which
is beginning to take place in the organism. In the
waking state, and amid the massive sensations, ideas,
and feelings aroused by the impressions of the outer
world, the faint beginnings of these pathological pro-
cesses are unnoticed; they first make themselves felt
to sleeping consciousness. Thus the first evidence of
approaching paralysis may be a very slight degree of
numbness which in the active waking state is not
noticed. During the tranquillity of sleep it is per-
ceived and magnified, as is customary to the dream-
ing activity, and the patient (in this case one of
Galen’s patients) dreams that his leg is turned to
stone.

It must, however, be acknowledged that in some
cases the association between the disorder and the
dream-image is not so evident. Thus many people
when threatened by a gastric or intestinal attack
dream of seeing fish. The late Professor Sergius
Botkin told me that he had found this coincidence in
his own case, and I have myself several times found
it in the case of a young girl who is well known to
me. Some have supposed that the sleeping con-
sciousness receives an impression of the elongated
shape of the stomach or intestine; but such a
supposition is easier to make than to prove.

Symptomatic dreams, or the characteristic dreams
which belong to a definite disease, have not yet been
carefully investigated. The most detailed and elabor-
ate investigation yet made has been by Dr. Sante de

dreaming in hysteria. 295

Sanctis, who has devoted a volume of two hundred
nacres to the sleeping activities in epilepsy^ and
hysteria, investigating 53 cases of grave hysteria, 45
of slight hysteria, and 90 cases of epilepsy, omitting
those of a dubious nature. He sets out to inquire
whether, not only in insanity but also in hysteria and
epilepsy, there is what may be called a “nocturnal
syndrome” or group of characteristic signs belonging
to the disease and assisting in the diagnosis and
prognosis. He has accumulated a large number
of detailed facts bearing on this point, and comes
to the conclusion that in hysteria and epilepsy there
is such a nocturnal syndrome, of which the culmina-
tion in epilepsy is the attack, and of which the
various preliminary or subsequent phases include
such phenomena as hallucinations, hypnagogic dreams
and nightmare, forming a variable whole difficult to
determine, but of undoubted reality. The nature
and frequency of dreams and cerebral over-activity
during sleep also constitute a special symptom of
hysteria. The dreams of epileptics, he found, are
more liable to be affected by the weather than those
of the hysterical, so that in this respect epilepsy
merits its ancient name of morbus astralis or lunaticus.
They are also less complex and briefer than those of
the hysterical, whether terrifying or merely indifferent
in character. The dreams of the hysterical are often
real romantic dramas, while in the epileptic they
are but panoramas, visions, rapid scenes. In the
hysterical macrozooscopic dreams and dreams of con-
trast prevail ; while in the epileptic subject the most
frequent dreams are those of a lascivious character,
or those in which he feels his own physical personality
profoundly changed, dreams evidently due to changes

296

SLEEP.

in the coenaesthcsia such as arc not uncommon in
epileptics in the waking state. The dreams of the
hysterical often influenced their waking life and the
course of the symptoms, but only in six cases was it
found that the disease was thereby aggravated; in
more than half the cases (25 out of 45), however, the
humour and conduct during the day were influenced
by the dreams, and De Sanctis thinks that this
probably occurred in many other cases. At the
same time, De Sanctis points out that there are,
properly speaking, no specific epileptic or hysterica!
dreams, only a certain relation between the nature of
the sleep and dreams and the evolution of the
disease.^

Essentially morbid dreams include all those pheno-
mena which are now commonly called nightmare, and
which were in early Christian times attributed to
demons, incubi and succubi, although Oribasius in
the fourth century, and many other physicians, argued
that they were pathological phenomena.^ -

It is probable that various distinct phenomena are
commonly included under the name of nightmare.
Thus the severe form called pavor nocturnns^ or night-

S. de Sanctis, I Sogm e il Souno nelV Isterisvio et nella Epilessa.
Roma, 1896.

2 The belief in the spiritual reality of incubi as the demons of night-
mare still persists. The following instance may be mentioned, as it is
also an example of a rare form of morbid symptomatic dreaming. A
3'Oung girl of defective intelligence in the asylum at Werneck was subject
to epileptic fits, only occurring during sleep, in which she opened her
eyes with a fixed stare, stretched out an arm or a leg stiffly, and in-
variably dreamed that a man lay beside her and asked her to lie
further off, as he wished to occupy her place. The nurses, considering
it a case of demoniacal incubus, advised her to say a prayer, which,
however, failed to evade the attack. (Lehmann, Allgem. Zeitschrift fiir
Psychialrie, Bd. li.. Heft 2, 1894.)

NIGHTMARE.

297

terror, and occurring only in early life, is a distinct
affection. It appears only between the second and
eighth year; there is always a neurotic family
history, and convulsions have been a frequent pre-
cursor. At the same time there may be no other
sign of ill-health. In night-terrors the onset is
marked by a sharp cry ; the child sees some object
which inspires him with terror, he springs from his
bed, crouches in a. corner and protests vociferously.
He recognises no one, and in the morning has no
recollection of what has happened. The same
vision is likely to reappear in future attacks ; and
it is held by some that this affection is allied to
epilepsy.’-

In its ordinary forms nightmare is associated with
a disturbed sleep, and especially with dyspepsia ;
fulness of the stomach and the eating of indigestible
food late in the evening are among the best recog-
nised causes of nightmare ; it acts mechanically by
interfering with the action of the diaphragm, and so
indirectly with the circulation of blood in the brain.
If the collar of the night-dress is too tight, or if the
pillow is misplaced so as to bring the head into a
wrong angle in relation to the body, the circulation
may likewise be interfered with and nightmare pro-
duced. Sensations of discomfort from any part of the
body — heart, respiratory or digestive organs, bladder,
ovaries (it is specially common about the time of
menstruation) — may originate nightmare. Fatigue,
emotional excitement, anxiety, a long walk, going
to the theatre, a school examination, may also
bring it on.

The physical symptoms in nightmare, as described
^ Coutts, Medical Standard ^ May 1896.

2gS

SLEEP.

by Ham monel, 1 who has devoted special attention to
this subject, include groaning, flushing of the face,
neck, and chest, cold perspiration, especially on the
forehead, sometimes a general trembling of the whole
body ; the respiration is particularly disturbed and
the breathing sometimes stertorous. It is remarkable
that, except for some slight irregularity due to re-
spiratory disturbance, the pulse is rarely affected.

The psychic symptoms are chiefly made up of fear
together with a feeling of utter helplessness. The
dreamer is engaged in a struggle and is seeking to
bring his muscles into action, but they are powerless,
and he feels helpless to escape from his foes. These
foes consist of all sorts of animals or demons. One
dreamer is mentioned who was visited almost nightly
by a great black walrus which appeared to roll off a
huge block of ice, crawl on to the bed, and throw
itself on his chest. Another was tormented by an
animal, half lion and half monkey, which seated itself
on his breast and fastened its claws into his throat
In other cases there are no images, but only the sense
of being placed in a dangerous position, or subjected
to a torturing operation. Thus one lady imagines
that she is poised on the top of a high mast and in
extreme danger of falling off, while another thinks
that she is being dragged through a keyhole by some
invisible power.

After all that has been said in previous pages with
regard to the large dependence of the phenomena of
sleeping consciousness on the state of the organs and
tissues, it is easy to understand that when a group of
persons are placed under uniform conditions their
dreams also may be more or less uniform. Such

^ 0/>. cU,, pp. 250 et seq.

COLLECTIVE DREAMS.

299

collective dreams have been recorded by various
medical observers. Thus Nudow relates that during
a tempest that arose one autumn night nearly all the
travellers in a Dantzig hotel had the same dream,
imagining that a carriage full of passengers had
noisily driven up to the door of the hptel ; each by
turn in the morning asked the servant who had
arrived during the night, and each was surprised to
hear that no one had come and that no carriage had
been seen. Burdach, who refers to this incident,
mentions that he himself one night, while staying at
an inn during a stormy night, dreamed that he was
driving in the blackness of night along the edge of a
steep precipice, and in the morning found that his
travelling companion had had the same dream. A
much more remarkable observation was made in the
last century by Laurent, who was surgeon-major in
one of Latour d’Auvergne’s regiments, when garri-
soned at Palmi, in Calabria.^ Orders had been received
to march at once to Tropea to oppose the landing of
a fleet which threatened that part of the country. It
was June, and the troops, about 800 in number, had
to march about forty miles. They started at mid-
night and reached their destination at seven o’clock
in the evening, resting but little by the way and
suffering greatly from the heat. When they reached
Tropea they were the last battalion to arrive, having
come from the farthest point, and were assigned the
• worst barracks, which would normally accommodate
only half the number of men. They were crowded
together on straw on the bare ground, and being
without covering were unable to undress. The build-

^ Laurent, de Medecine, 1818; also Parant, art. “Incubi,”

Grand Diet, de Med., vol. xxxiv.

300

SLEEP.

ing was an abandoned abbey, and the inhabitants
piedicted that the men would not be able to stay
there, as the place was frequented by ghosts. “ VVe
laughed at their credulity,” says Laurent, “but what
was our surprise to hear about midnight the most
frightful cries issuing from every corner of the abbey,
and to see the soldiers rushing terrified from the
building. I questioned them in regard to the cause
of their alarm, and all replied that the devil lived in
the building, that they had seen him enter by an
opening into their room, in the form of a very
large dog with long black hair, and, throwing him-
self upon their chests for an instant, disappear
through another opening in the opposite side of the
apartment. We laughed at their consternation, and
endeavoured to prove to them that the phenomenon
was due to a very simple and natural cause, and was
only the effect of their imagination ^ but we failed to
convince them, nor could we persuade them to return
to their barracks.” The following night they refused
to go to the barracks unless the officers went also.

“ I went there,” Laurent continues, “ at half-past
eleven, with the commanding officer ; the other
officers were distributed in the several rooms. We
scarcely expected to witness a repetition of the
events of the preceding night, for the soldiers had
gone to sleep, reassured by the presence of their
officers, who remained awake. But about one o’clock,
in all the rooms at the same time, the cries of the
previous night were repeated, and again the soldiers
rushed out to escape the suffocating embrace of the
big black dog. As may be supposed, we had seen
nothing.” The men returned to Palmi on the follow-
ing day, and the phenomenon was not again repro-

THE GROUPING OF DREAM-IMAGES. $01

diiced. Laurent was of opinion that the forced march
on a very hot day, by weakening the men and fatiguing
the organs of respiration, had predisposed them to
these attacks of nightmare ; while the constrained
position in which they were obliged to lie, the fact of
not being undressed, and the bad air aided in the pro-
duction of the phenomenon. It may be added that
there was probably an element of suggestion also,
since the men were told that the place was haunted.

To understand these cases of collective dreams,
and indeed the phenomena of dreaming generally,
we have to bear in mind the ordinary law of asso-
ciation by resemblance, which is in operation during
sleep and affects sensations and feelings as well as
ideas. Serguejeff cites the observations of an unknown
author concerning certain associations between a
definite sensation and a whole scries of ideas and
thoughts. In these observations the subject had
during a certain period of his existence always used
the same perfume; then changinghis whole surround-
ings and mode of life, for a long time he used another
perfume and left the first always unopened. If during
this period he was without dreams of this early period
he would hand over the early perfume to his servant,
telling him on some following morning when he found
him asleep to moisten the corner of the pillow, taking
care at the same time not to awake him. Every time
this was done the sleeper dreamed of those past con-
. ditions of life during which he had used that perfume.
This observation is of value as showing the possibility
of provoking at will groups of dream-images; it is,
however, in harmony with other well-known facts,
usually discovered accidentally ; many such facts
have been cited in previous pages.

302

SLEEP.

The Dreams of the Blind— \Nc have had such
frequent occasion to discuss the close connection
between the subjective life of the sensory organs and
the psychic life of dreaming that there is interest in
considering what happens in those who are blind, or
who have been deprived of other senses or of their
limbs.

This matter was first investigated, and with much
ability, so long ago as 1838 by Heermann.i His ob-
servations, which were made on 100 subjects, showed
that in the blind generally dreams are raror than in
normal subjects, and that visual sensations and ideas
were completely absent in those cases (fourteen in
number) who had lost their sight previous to the fifth
year. In cases of blindness beginning between the
fifth and the seventh year the subjects felt for the
most part uncertain; but all those who became blind
after the seventh year had dream-vision. The less
intelligent, however, rarely saw dream-visions. He
found that they were maintained in some cases for over
fifty years after blindness came on ; then, however, they
faded. (Other inquirers state that, as a rule, dream
visions die out after about fifteen years of blindness.)
He demonstrated by post-mortem examinations that
the dying-out of dream-vision was not due to
degeneration of the optic nerve, for he found that
the optic nerve atrophied in about twenty years, but
that dream-vision continued beyond this period.

More recently Professor Jastrow, of Wisconsin, in
a valuable and interesting paper, has published the
results of a similar investigation (begun in ignorance

^ G. Ileermann, “ Beobachtungen und Betrachtungen iiber (He
Traume der Monatsschrift fur Medicin, etc., i. pp. 1 16-180,

Leipzig.

DREAMS OF THE BLIND.

303

of Heermann’s earlier researches) on two hundred
persons of both sexes in the institutions for the blind
at Philadelphia and Baltimore.^

Jastrow examined fifty-eight cases of total blind-
ness (including under this head those upon whom
light has simply a general subjective “heat-effect,”
enabling them to distinguish between night and
day, between shade and sunshine, but inducing
little or no tendency to project the cause of the
sensation into the external world). Of these, thirty-
two became blind before completing their fifth year,
an<l not one of these thirty-two saw in dreams. Six
became blind between the fifth and the seventh year;
of these, four had dreams of seeing, but two of them
so seldom and with some vagueness, while two never
dreamed of seeing at all. Of twenty persons who
became blind after their seventh year all had dream-
vision. The period from the fifth to the seventh year
is thus marked out as the critical one. Before this age
the visual centre is undergoing its elementary educa-
tion; its life is closely dependent upon the constant
food-supply of sensations, and when these are cut off
by blindness it degenerates and decays. If blindness
occurs between the fifth and the seventh years, the
preservation of the visualising power depends on the
degree of development of the individual. If the
faculty is retained, it is neither stable nor pronounced.
If sight is lost after the seventh year, the sight-centre,
.can, in spite of the loss, maintain its function, and the
dreams of such an individual are hardly distinguish-
able from those of a seeing person.

Jastrow also sought to find out whether in the

J. Jastrow, “Dreams of the Blind,” Pri7tceto7i Review, Julv

304

SLEEP.

partially blind dream-vision remains clear or is
impaired, a question to which the reply w.as less satis-
factory. Of twenty-three who described their dream-
vision as only as clear as waking sight, all became
blind not later than the close of their fifth year;
while of twenty-four whose dream-vision is more or
less markedly clearer than their partial sight, all lost
their full sight not earlier than their sixth year. The
age that marks off those to whom total blindness
carries with it the loss of dream-vision from those
whose dream-vision continues is thus the age at
which the sight-centre has reached a sufficient stage
of development to enable it to maintain its full
function when partially or totally deprived of retinal
stimulation. The same age is also assigned by some
authorities as the limiting age at which deafness will
cause muteness (unless special pains be taken to pre-
vent it), while later the vocal organs, though trained
to action by the ear, can perform their duties without
the teacher’s aid. This, too, is assigned as the earliest
age at which we have a remembrance of ourselves.
This Jastrow directly tested by obtaining one hundred
answers to the question, " What is your earliest re-
m.embrance of yourself?” The average age to
which these memories go back is 5.2 years, seventy-
nine instances being included between the third
and the sixth years. At this period of child
development — the centre of which is about the close
of the fifth year — there seems to be a general
“declaration of independence” of the sense-centres
from their food-supply of sensations.

Jastrow, with the assistance of Professor Stanley
Hall, has also investigated the dreams of those who
are at once both blind and deaf, more especially

DREAMS OF THE BLIND AND DEAF. 305

Laura Bridgman. Sight and hearing were as absent
from her dreams as they are from the dark and
silent world which alone she knew. The tactual-
motor sensations, by which she communicated with
her fellow-beings, and through which almost all her
intellectual food was brought, were also her mainstay
in dreams. This accounts for the suddenness and
fright with which she often woke from her dreams;
an animal which to -us would first make itself seen or
heard, to her was present in dream only when it
touched and startled her. Language has become so
all-important a factor in civilised life that it naturally is
frequently represented in dreams. We not only dream
of speaking and being spoken to, but we actually
innervate the appropriate muscles and talk in our
sleep. This was the case with Laura Bridgman.
“Her sleep seemed almost never undisturbed by
dreams. Again and again she would suddenly talk
a few words or letters with her fingers, too rapidly
and too imperfectly to be intelligible (just as other
people utter incoherent words and inarticulate sounds
in sleep), but apparently never making a sentence.”
So, too, all the people who entered into her dreams
talked with their fingers ; this was already present at
the age of twelve, four years after her first lesson in
the alphabet.

A study of this kind, as Jastrow remarks, leads to
the investigation of the peculiarities of imagination
in the blind. “ It is not difficult to understand that
the blind are deprived of one powerful means of
cultivating this faculty, that the eye is in one sense
the organ of the ideal. Their knowledge is more
realistic {JiandgreiflicJi), and so their dreams often
lack all poetical characteristics, and are very common-

3o6

SLEEP.

place. Ghosts, elves, fairies, monsters, and all the
host of strange romance that commonly people
dreams, are not nearly so well represented as in the
dreams of the sighted. What is almost typical in
the dreams of the latter is unusual in the dreams
of the blind. Many observe that such dreams grow
rare as they outgrow their youth, which is probably
also true of the sighted. When the blind dream of
ghosts they either hear them, and that usually not
until they are close at hand, or they are actually
touched by them. A blind man, describing a dream
in which his friend appeared to him, said: ‘Then I
dreamt that he tried to frighten me, and make believe
he was a ghost, by pushing me down sidezvaysl etc.
By some the ghost is heard only; it has a rough
voice and its bones rattle; or it pursues the victim,
humming and groaning as it runs.” Jastrow found
that hearing is the chief sense of the blind in sleeping
as in waking life; the tactual-motor sensations, which
play a large part, and which some have put first, he
finds to be second. A blind boy who dreams of
Alexander the Great putting the Gauls to flight hears
the thunder of cannon but sees no flash; another
dreams of the Judgment Day mainly in terms of
hearing ; he was drawn to heaven by a rope (such
as he knew la^ened to an exercising pole), and
heard trumpets sounding and voices singing; a
young man dreamed that his mother was dead,
knowing this by the cold touch of the body, and
so on.

More recently Hitschmann, who has been blind
from the age of three, though he is still able to
distinguish between light and darkness, has given an
account of his own dream-life, and has discussed the

DREAMS OF CRIPPLES.

307

subject generally.^ He never dreams of seeing, and
considers that the blind in general have weaned
themselves from their deficienc}^ and feel themselves
in an accustomed natural condition. They have not
that painful longing for light which is poetically
ascribed to them. Naturally their dreams are com-
pounded of the other sensations, especially the
impressions of hearing. The blind dream of voices,
by which the persons of their acquaintance are
recognised, just as the seeing often dream of faces
and figures. Sometimes animals, especially dogs and
birds, seem to the sightless to have human voices and
to be gifted with speech. A blind man who travelled
home once a year used to dream of the journey
by rail. In this case the dreams were made up of
rumbling wheels, whistle of the locomotive, feeling of
fresh air through the open windows and the smell of
food sold at the station. While the dream world of
ihe blind is poor in sensory images, it is rich in
abstract phenomena. It is characteristic of their
dreams that the dreamer often feels as if he were a
spectator at a theatre; he seems to witness novels,
dramas, or philosophical lectures, such impressions
apparently coming through the sense of hearing.

There is an interest, also, in this connection in
studying the dreams of those who* are born without
arms or feet. Heermann mentioned such a case in
which the man always dreamed of walking on his
. knees as in waking life. It is said that in other cases
of similar deformity dreams of walking normally have

^ F. Hitschmann, Zeitschrift f-iir Psychologic tend Physiologic der
Sinnesorgane, October 1894* The same writer has also discussed the
assthetic emotions of the blind, Vzerielj ahrsschrift fiir wissenschaflliche
Philosophic, Bd. xvii. 3.

3o8

SLEEP.

occurred; if well established such cases might be of
considerable significance.

Those who have lost their arms or legs follow
much the same laws as those who have lost their
sight. Professor James, investigating the experiences
of 185 persons who had undergone amputation, found
that three-fourths still experienced sensations in the
lost limb, but in the others it had faded out after
hours, weeks, or years. One man of seventy still felt
distinctly the leg which he had lost at the age of
thirteen; while another experienced such vivid sensa-
tions in the lost foot that he found himself getting
out a pair of scissors to cut the toe-nails.^ So like-
wise in dreams the amputated do not imagine that
they are using crutches but that they are walking on
their feet, with this difference, that the limb in time
may appear to become shorter until the toes seem to
join the stump. This hallucination has been specially
noted in cases in which the wound healed rapidly
without complication. If there has, on the contrary,
been much suppuration and painful cicatrisation the
patient receives a mass of new sensations which
seem to familiarise him with the changed form of his
limb. A man who lost his right arm at the age of
twenty-three still dreamed of it at forty. Observa-
tions on amputations at an early age are not numerous,
so that it is difficult to say precisely at what age this
hallucination begins ; the case is mentioned of a boy
who lost his leg at ten and was still dreaming of it
some years later.

Dreami;ng in Criminals. — The study of dreams in
defective organisms leads us to ask whether the

1 W. James, “ The Consciousness of Lost Limbs,” Proceediufp of
American Society for Psychical Research, vol. i. p. 249.

DREAMING IN CRIMINALS.

309

dreams of criminals show any special characters.
Several writers have referred to the peaceful sleep
of criminals, and Despine long since remarked that
no sleep is so like the sleep of the just as the
murderer’s. Lately, however, De Sanctis has more
carefully examined this question with his customary
thoroughness and psychological insight.^ Observa-
tions were made on criminals belonging to Central
Italy, first on 40 criminals at Orvieto taken indis-
criminately, and subsequently on 85 criminals, in-
cluding 24 women, chosen from the worst subjects,
real criminal types, mostly condemned for crimes of
violence ; except in the Orvieto group they were
without obvious nervous disease. Taken altogether,
it was found that 29 dreamed often, 64 dreamed occa-
sionally, and 32 never dreamed. But while only 5
of the Orvieto group (40) of men (including many
affected by nervous disease) never dream, 24 of the
latter group (61) of more severe criminals never
dream. All but 3 of the women dream. All those
who dream (with the exception of the neurotic
subjects) say that in freedom they dreamed much
less than in prison ; this is true both of men and
women, being due to the greater idleness of prison
life, and perhaps also to the influence of changed
conditions of diet, etc. Those who never dream are
among the very worst criminals, and are often men-
tally deficient, and nearly all of them are in prison
. for life. The three women who never dream are one
who was found guilty of cruelty to her own child, an
old recidivist, and a young intelligent and pretty
girl guilty of murder.

^ Sante de Sanctis, “I Sogni nei Delinquent!,” Archivio di Psi-
chiatria, 1896, fasc. v. -vi.

310

SLEEP.

With regard to the emotional character of the
dreams, De Sanctis found that they were chiefly of a
terrifying and especially religious character, of per-
secution, falls from a height, quarrels, liberation from
prison, scenes of gaiety, and very often subjects con-
nected with the sexual sphere ; while the dreams
without emotional tone refer to the trivial events of
the day, etc. It is customary for a criminal to reply,
when asked what he dreamed about, “ I dreamed of
freedom ; ” this merely means that his dreams refer
most frequently to the period before incarceration.

De Sanctis inquired specially into the interesting
question of the relation of criminals’ dreams to their
crimes. Of the 93 criminals who dreamed he found
22 who sometimes dreamed of their crimes ; of those,
1 1 dreamed simply of the deed, without any emo-
tional accompaniment ; 1 1 experienced emotional
dreams of their crimes. Of the 21 women-dreamers,
4 had such dreams without, and 2 with emotion. A
few of the murderers very frequently see their victims
in dreams without any emotion j in one of these
cases the murderer dreams that his victim reproaches
him. The young woman guilty of ill-treating her
child never has emotional dreams and never sees her
child in dreams.

Thus criminals dream rarely and but little, and the
greatest criminals least of all ; in this, as De Sanctis
remarks, they resemble idiots. Even on the nights
following the crime they sleep deeply and peacefully,
although their sleep is, of course, liable to be disturbed
by special causes, such as illness, and is specially
liable to be modified by the weather. In a few cases
the sleep of criminals may be tormented, as was that of
Macbeth; and there is also an emotional and hysterical

DREAMING IN INFANTS.

3II

criminal type ; but this is very rare and scarcely re-
presented at all among criminals of the worst class.
They are real imbeciles so far as the feelings are
concerned, and in part also as regards intelligence.

The Utility of Dreams. — At what age do children
first begin to dream ? There can be little doubt that
dreams occur even during the first days of extra-
uterine life, but their domain is circumscribed by the
limited sensations and experiences- of the new-born
child. I may refer to the fact that movements of
suction occur during sleep even in the first weeks of
existence. In babies six months old I have observed
the apparent occurrence of more complicated dreams,
followed by smiling. The conscious narration of
dreams cannot of course appear until the period,
varying in different individuals, when the child gains
the faculty of speech. Moreover, memory does not
extend back to the earliest years of childhood ; few
persons remember farther back than from the seventh
to the fifth year ; a few can recall events that occurred
when they were two or three years old ; perhaps the
earliest case recorded is that of a woman who could
recall all the circumstances of her first walk by herself
at the age of eleven months. Such memory supposes
a remarkably happy organisation of the central ner-
vous system.

We should carefully attend to the sleep of child-
hood, and the character and frequency of the dreams.
There can be no doubt that heavy or restless sleep
often announces the approach of illness. If children
groan or cry out in their sleep or are subject to the
night-terrors already described (p. 296), there is a
serious derangement of normal equilibrium calling for
medical attention. In the same way absence or rarity

312

SLEEP.

of dreaming in children is a bad sign. It must be
remembered also that mental over-strain, from which
so many, both children and adults, suffer in our time,
often shows itself first in the dreams.

But apart from their indirect medical utility, which
we have already dealt with in connection with morbid
dreams, they have a directly salutary influence in so
far as they serve to exercise regions of the brain which
in the waking state remain unemployed. I have else-
where referred to the injurious effects of monotony in
sensations, thoughts, and emotions j in this respect
dreams are extremely useful, for they bring a certain
variety into the most empty and uniform life. To the
poor they may thus in part take the place of mental
recreation, as Davidson, Burdach, Novalis, and others
have pointed out. Novalis remarks that dreams serve
as a breastplate against the monotony and triviality
of real life, and declares with truth that without
dreams we should grow older much more rapidly.
And without dreams, it may be added, not only
should we grow older more rapidly, but we should
find life more wearisome. Old age comes on more
swiftly in those who are mentally undeveloped — that
is, in those who dream little ; a fine intelligence and
an energetic consciousness constitute the best protec-
tion against the destructive influence of time.^

^ Mr. Greenwood, independently, has insisted at some length
{Itnagmation hi Dreams, pp. 78-88) on the function of dreams in
enlarging our imaginative knowledge of the possibilities of life. " If,”
he remarks, “ beyond the entertainment it affords there be any use in
literature, any use in the novelist’s pictures, the poet’s revelations, the
dramatists embodiment and display of human feeling, it must be some-
thing to have the stage erected in our own breasts, the scene our own
lives, the stir of emotion and passion our own in situations of acute trial
and intense meaning.”

THE UTILITY OF DREAMS. 313

To appreciate rightly the utility of dreams we must
remember around what commonplace surroundings
the lives of many people pass, painted, as it were,
grey on a grey background ; so that even during a
long period of such existence they can retain few
memories worthy of attention. But they still retain
an involuntary dramatic and imaginative power in
sleep. “It would be no great exaggeration to say,”
as Maudsley remarks in his admirable and oft-quoted
chapter on dreaming, “ that the dramatic power of a
dunce in dreaming exceeds that which is displayed
by the most imaginative writer in his waking state.”
I have myself known an old woman of sixty who
preserved the memory of a dream as^the happiest
recollection of her whole long life. She would become
radiant with animation as ^he narrated that sacred
dream which had thrown its single ray of splendour
on an existence made up of petty miseries and petty
satisfactions. In that memorable dream she had been
to the palace of the Tsar himself, and she never tired
of telling the dream which represented the one poetic
element in a monotonous life of labour and trouble.
Even among the cultured and educated there are
perhaps not many who have not at some period
experienced a more or less prolonged feeling of joy
and satisfaction after a vivid dream of a beloved
person, an emotion which is often still stronger if that
person is no longer living.

It is, moreover, a common experience that the
thoughts we have not been able to control so as to
be able to take a definite resolution often become
clear and defined after a night’s quiet sleep. This
influence of sleep is embodied in the popular wisdom
of many nations. A Russian proverb says that the

314

SLEEP.

morning is the time to make up one’s mind; and
there are German, French, English, and Italian
proverbs to the effect that the morning hour has gold
in its mouth, that we must always sleep over an
impoitant lesolution, and that the night brings counsel.
That this is not always merely due to the results of
repair of fatigue seems to be indicated by the account
given by Macario of a young lady, a music teacher
personally known to him, who studied music amid
frequent interruption and difficulties; she told him
that she had observed that whenever she dreamed of
studymg a piece of music which she was actually
studying she found in the morning that she knew it
far more perfectly than when she went to bed; thus
it appears to have been not the rest but the dream
which assisted her.

Franklin told Cabanis that he had been helped by
dreams in many of the affairs of life, and a great
many men of science, poets, philosophers, musicians,
and others have declared that they received important
ideas and suggestions in dreams (Burdach, Lotze,
Voltaire, Condillac, Condorcet, Coleridge, Tartini,
Macario, and many others),^ Some of these facts,

1 Schleyer, the inventor of Volapuk, we are told by Post, conceived
that language in a dream: “Quick perception, retentive memory, and
untiring industry enabled him to master, during thirty years of study,
the grammatical structure of over fifty languages and dialects. The
mass of material brought together by Schleyer became unwieldy and
irreducible. In part it was chaotic. The pieces were there, but they
were the pieces of a puzzle. The heterogeneous parts were so numer-
ous that selection from them to form a homogeneous whole caused a
wearisome work, ending in frequent and ever-changing confusion.
One night this patient student retired for sleep. Before him, in orderly
array, trooped the necessary characters, forms, and processes out of
the bewildering assemblage of the fifty languages which had confused
his waking thoughts. The vision ended : he rose from his bed, found

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF DREAMING.

315

which have been recorded too often to be repeated
here, are undoubtedly reliable, though others rest on
vague and more uncertain evidence. . And certain
authors (N. Lange, Helmholtz, Griesinger, Brodie,
Maudsley, Beneke, Herbart, Fechner, etc.) have in
this way found ground for believing that much that
we honour in literature, science, and art is the direct
result of mental work during sleep, and due to un-
conscious cerebral, activity.

The Significance of Dreaming. — There is still some-
thing to be said as to the general significance of
dreaming in relation to psychic life generally. And,
first, we may ask whether a complete absence of
dreams is possible. The solution of this question is
surrounded by difficulties, and the results of various
observations are not altogether harmonious. Some
authors have asserted that sleep is impossible without
dreams, while others consider that dreaming is an
exceptional, even pathological, incident in the life
of sleep.

We have seen that sleep represents the repose of
the individual consciousness, as determined by the
circumstances of his life at the present moment.
In sleep the man may therefore cease to live
in the present, but may think, feel, and judge as he
thought, felt, and judged at some earlier stage in his
development,^ He becomes conscious of the old

light and paper and pen, and recorded on a single sheet of note-
paper his language, which to-day is substantially what was revealed
to Schleyer on that night of vision.”

^ Giessler {Die physiologischen Beziehungen der Traumvorgange,
p. 36) enumerates various points in which there is a resemblance
between dream-life and the life of children. Sully, in the course of an
eloquent article on “ The Dream as a Revelation ” {Fortnightly Revieiv,
March 1893), has brought forward the same point : — “ Here, again, we

3i6

SLEEP.

mental scars, which, as Seymour Taylor remarks, are
left on the iDsychic organism by every impression of
the past, and are only revealed in dreams, in the
delirium of fever, the epileptic aura, or other un-
usual physiological force, or abnormal pathological
influence.^

appear to see a reversion to a primitive phenomenon. Absorption in
the bodily life is the characteristic of infancy before the growing
intelligence has been attracted and held by the ever-changing spectacle
of the external world. It is probable that a child or an animal feels its
hunger with an overpowering intensity of sensation, of which grown
persons know next to nothing. A slight change of temperature is for
the infant a stupendous calamity. When asleep we may be said to go
back to this primitive animal immersion in bodily sensation. The all-
important groundwork of our life once more engages our thought, w'e
hear the heart beat, and feel the incoming and outgoing of the breath ;
we rejoice with the weary limb in its repose, with the chilled extremity
warmed by an effusion of generous blood, or, on the other hand,
suffer with the over-laden stomach or with the cramp-seized muscles.
By restoring the bodily factor of consciousness to its primitive supremacy
our dreams may properly be described as revelations.”

^ “ What is known as a mental impression I should prefer to call a
‘ mental scar,’ which, like ordinary scars in ordinary tissues, depends
for its durability on the depth and intensity of the force occasioning it.
And as all bodily scars except the most trivial are ineradicable, so I
think all mental impressions— save those which are so light and
transitory as to barely constitute a mental process — are permanent.
It is no argument against this view that memory fails and that forget-
fulness occurs. The imprint is there, and the ‘mental scar’ is not
necessarily obliterated because we cannot for the moment find it. A
patient of mine in severe delirium went through a long speech of a
character in one of Bulwer Lytton’s plays. On recovery he could not
repeat a word of the speech, nor has he at any time subsequently,
although repeatedly pressed by me to do so, been able to recollect any
part of the speech, and cannot understand how he ever recited it.
In my own case, during the height of scarlet fever, I recollected a
peculiarity in the hair of a relative who died when I was a child.

I have ascertained that this peculiarity did exist, but I was certainly in
ignorance thereof until the stimulus of a fever recalled the mental
impression. It is all very well for the poet to say.

DREAMING A REVELATION OF THE PAST. 317

But not only are the bounds of personal conscious-
ness extended vaguely in sleep so as to cover all the
past life of the sleeper. It is even possible to hold that
consciousness is still further extended, and that the
consciousness of the species, and even its predeces-
sors, may be represented in the psychic organism and
reappear in sleep. Professor Stanley Hall, the dis-
tinguished American psychologist, has argued with
some force that .on this supposition only can we
understand the phenomena of morbid fears. Protest-
ing against the tendency of Weismannism to limit the
full recognition of evolution in the field of psychology,
he points out that “ however different soul and body
may be, they have been associated like twins from the
first, so that if there have been metempsychoses there
have been parallel metasomatoses, that as organisa-
tion of brain has been found increasingly complex,
we must look well to it that our conceptions of soul
do not leave it mean, parasitic, or even epigenetic,
but make it no whit less involved and venerable than
the body, with rudimentary and vanishing organs
like it, and like the living soma, subject to incessant
change, to know the laws of which is the goal of
psychology.”^ All that our ancestors lived, felt.

‘ Yea, from the table of my memory
I’ll wipe away all trivial fond records,

All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past.

That youth and observation copied there ; ’

but the more one studies cases like the above the more one will tend to
the conclusion that the scar, the instinct, the stain, or whatever simile
we may use, is fixed permanently on our mental tablets.” — S. Taylor,
“A Case of Intellectual Aura or Dreamy State,” Lancet, 9th August
1890.

^ “ A Study of Fears,” Am. Jour. Psych,, 1897, p. 244. Some
years ago, Laycock (“A Chapter on some Organic Laws of Memory,”
Joiir, Ment. Science, July 1875) concluded “that when men or

3i8

SLEEP.

and suffered during countless ages of time, all
that they condensed into images and faculties
and definite movements has been passed on to us,
not, indeed, as such, but in the shape of latent
capacities and possibilities inherent in our neuro-
cerebral system. And thus it may well be during
sleep, when the immediate personal consciousness is
inactive, that these fatent characters of the psychic
organism inherited from our remotest ancestors stir
within us, and fill with strange images and un-
foreseen desires our inner world. Every one some-
times dreams of acts, thoughts, and desires in direct
contradiction with all his whole character, his con-
victions and tastes; he dreams of things which cause
him horror when awake and fill him with disgust.
The best and most honest of men sometimes execute
in their dreams the most dishonest and cruel deeds.
How can we explain such dreams?

The explanation that I would offer lies in the
sleep of personal consciousness. As soon as a man’s
personal consciousness is profoundly lulled and
consequently inactive, all the tendencies transmitted
by his farthest ancestors which were latent in his
waking consciousness now begin to revive. The
more atavistic the character of the dream the more
paradoxical and strange it must appear to waking

animals manifest impulses of an umccountable character, and experi-
ence pleasures, and sympathies, ani pains, and antipathies, which
seem to be out of relation to their culture and personal] experience, or
to the culture of the family or the race, whether in dreams or when
waking, the source of these must be found in long past or ancestral
memories reproduced according to the law of reversion ; but being out
of relation to the external conditions of the individual, and not, there-
fore, developed by reflex action due to external impressions, they are not
revived as knowledge.”

ATAVISTIC DREAMS.

319

consciousness. It is true that on awaking conscious-
ness can with little difficulty reconstruct the texture
of dreams from the traces they have left; but this is
only possible for dreams that are not in direct contra-
diction with personal consciousness — that is to say,
those originating in the ideas and feelings of one’s own
personal psychic world. It is only with great diffi-
culty that consciousness can reconstruct the tissues
of a dream formed of elements foreign to personal
consciousness and traceable to elements that are
latent during waking consciousness. Reminiscence
is impeded because waking personal consciousness
no longer recognises itself in such dreams, and is
unable to recognise and group the traces which seem
to bring a barbarous dissonance into the psychic
world. Such retrospective and atavistic dreams
seem therefore mostly to occur towards morning,
because then consciousness is more refreshed and
better able to realise the strangeness of the dream
images, which themselves contribute to arouse it still
further. In such a case a good and peaceful man
may awake in horror with forehead bathed in sweat
from a dream in which he has been transported into
some strange and antipathetic environment in which
he had committed a barbarous and cruel deed, not
altogether abnormal, but fully possible in the far past
of humanity.^ We have all had such dreams, and half-

^ Greenwood has vividly described such a dream, in which the
absence of horror may be noted: — “Many years ago I dreamed of
having killed a man by throwing him from the verge of an old un-
frequented quay. The murder itself did not come into the dream,
which began (according to my waking remembrance) just after I had
turned from the scene. In my case horror there was none, the dream
was of guilt alone; and whenever I review that vision of myself stealing
away through the old streets that bordered the quay (it was early

320

SLEEP.

awaking consciousness has reassured us with the
thought that they are but dreams; while in other
cases the atavistic dream so offends consciousness
that immediate and complete awakening is provoked.
In the presence of such Maudslcy may well exclaim
that if we were held responsible for our dreams, there
is no man living who would not deserve to be
hanged.

Thus these retrospective or atavistic dreams plunge
us into the long past periods of the development of
the general consciousness of the species, and if they
do not produce a sufficiently strong impression to
cause at least a partial awakening of sleeping con-
sciousness, we retain no recollection of them and have
no means of reconstructing the images and feelings
of which they were formed. Indeed, to remember
and reconstruct dreams generally requires a certain
amount of practice, and all those who have had
occasion to study dreaming know that it is developed
and strengthened by exercise (Nelson). The ordinary
conditions of contemporary life do not lend themselves
to the development of this practice, and thus many
people pay so little attention to their dreams that they
are not conscious of having dreamed at all. In the
same way, in the waking state, we may see an object,
forget it, and maintain that we have never seen it. I
have already had occasion to remark that it is only
under morbid conditions, among the uneducated, idiots,
criminals, etc., that it is common to find even an

morning, and the streets were bathed in a thin, clear, slanting light), and
when I recall my sensations, the whole mind of me an abyss of listening
silence, my very footsteps seeming noiseless, and a wide environment
of distance standing between me and every passer-by, I believe I
really do know the awful solitude a murderer feels.”

DREAMING AND AIENTAE DEVELOPMENT. 32 1

apparent absence of dreams, whether real or not.
Even among the blind, who are probably not such good
dreamers as those who see, Jastrow found that among
183 persons who answered the question, “Do you
dream?” the percentage of those answering “No”
was only i.i, while 7.6 per cent, dreamed every
night, the women more frequently than the men.^

On the whole, high mental development is always
associated with a greater amount of dreaming, since
it involves greater impressionability of the neuro-
cerebral system. Comparisons in this respect can,
however, only be made between persons of the same
sex and the same age, for these conditions notably
modify the impressionability and the stability of the
traces of dreaming activity. Not only are women
cfreater dreamers than men of the same age, and
unmarried women more than married women (Heer-
wagen), but age is a very important factor, the young
being much greater dreamers than the aged. Jastrow
found among the blind a decline in the prevalence of
dreaming as we pass from the period between five
and nine years to the period between ten and fourteen
years, a slighter decline in the next five years, and
then a gradual decrease. Heerwagen, while pointing
out also the frequency of dreams in the young, finds
that dreaming reaches its greatest intensity between
the twentieth and the twenty-fifth years.^

Heerwagen noted that in frequency of dreaming
male students form a class between men and women,

^ For a summary of the data with regard to sexual differences in
nature and amount of dreaming, see H. Ellis, Ma7t and Woman,
pp. 263 et seq.

^ F. Heerwagen, “ Statistische Untersuchungen liber Traume und
Schlaf,” Wundt’s Philosophische Shidien, Bd. ii.

and in evidence of the fact that personal development
and occupation help to determine the quality of
dreams, I may refer to Maudsley’s statement that
after absorption during the waking state in scien-
tific work involving severe and systematic efforts of
thought, dreams may become more regular and logical
in their texture. Such an influence is, it need scarcely
be added, liable to be counteracted by the other in-
fluences which we have found to affect the psychic
sleep, such as the phenomena of contrast and the
frequent tendency of dreams to deal with the past
rather than the present^

The various facts and considerations brought
forward in preceding pages lead to the conclusion
that the absence of dreams, real or apparent, is a
phenomenon of unfavourable significance, since it
indicates probably a feebleness of the traces of
sleeping psychic life, and certainly a poverty of
mental associations, and consequently of the psychic
life generally. My own observations convince me
that the absence of dreams is often ‘a premonitory
symptom of mental or nervous disease. Macario
long ago noted that in dementia there is a complete
absence of any evidence showing the existence of
dreams. In old age, moreover, dreams are almost
exclusively composed of reminiscences dating from
childhood and youth; for, as is well known, as mental
energy departs, it is the latest acquisitions of the
neuro-cerebral system that are first lost

1 Heermann mentions the case of a blind man who never dreamed of
the hospital in which he had been living for eighteen years, and to
which he had been brought shortly after he became blind. Jastrow
observed, again among the blind, that 42 persons found recent
dreams more frequent, 27 remote dreams, and in 22 they were equally
frequent.

rROPIIETIC DREAMS.

It has already been pointed out that our re-
miniscences of the past may be more vivid in the
sleeping than in the waking state. The various
forms of paramnesia, or delusions of memory, as
noted by Miss Calkins and others, abound in dreams.
This abnormal heightening of memory, which oc-
casionally occurs during sleep, has led to the
belief in prophetic dreams, in which facts are
revealed which Seem to the consciousness of the
waking man to lie outside his knowledge. Thus
Abercrombie for several days tried to recall a
verse of the Bible he had learned as a child of
seven; his efforts were unsuccessful, but one night
in a dream he saw before him this verse and the
chapter of Jeremiah in which it occurred. The same
author mentions the case of a bank clerk who, in
making up his accounts, found a deficit of £6. He
.sought in vain to remember what he had done with
the money. At night, however, he saw in a dream a
stammering man who begged him to give him this
sum at once, and he handed it over immediately, in
order not to keep him waiting. On awaking he
reflected on the dream, and was able to prove its
accuracy. Lidbault records another dream of this
class: a patient of his dreamed that she was in
danger of drowning, and was saved by a man named
Olry. Some years later a gentleman entered her
house bearing a strong resemblance to him who had
saved her in the dream. She was so struck by the re-
semblance that she at once asked : “ Is your name
Olry ? The unknown, who had only been seen
in a dream, replied that 'it was. This dream, as
Li^bault remarks, might pass for a miracle; but on
inquiry it was ascertained that this Olry lived only a

SLEEP,

few miles from the lady, who could very easily have
seen him; but she had forgotten this, as well as the
name of her imaginary saviour. Another case is

narrated by Maury: A certain M , who had been

educated at Montbrison and, twenty years previously,
had lived there for some time, at last resolved
to revisit the town. The night before leaving he
dreamed that on arriving at Montbrison he met a
gentleman who mentioned his name and said that he
was an old friend of his father’s. Next day he set
out for the town, and on arriving saw the landscape
of his dream, and was greeted by the gentleman of his
dream, who announced himself as his father’s friend;
he was, however, much older than in the dream. In
such a case it is clear that the emotion excited by the
approaching departure had aroused slumbering recol-
lections. Again, Macario tells us of a son who, having
inherited a plot of land from his parents, was well
able to recall having heard his father say that he had
bought the land and paid for it, but he was unable
anywhere to find the title-deeds, and ran the risk of
losing an action that was brought against him. On
the night before the case was to be definitely decided
he had a dream in which he saw his father, who told
him that the deeds were in the hands of a certain
retired notary. On awaking he proceeded to the
notary’s, obtained the deeds, and gained his case.’^

^ It is scarcely necessary to add that such dreams are frequently
considered supernatural. Thus Mr. Greenwood, in a charming but
unscientific volume on 2 maginalion in Dreams (p. loo), tells of what
he calls a “ dream of revelation”; in this case a lady dreamed that a
side door with a skylight was revealed to her as the means whereby
thieves entered the house. Although she and her family had lived in
this house for many years, she declared that she had never seen or heard
of that skylight and door before it was revealed in the dream. There

MEMORY IN DREAMS.

325

In the face of such facts it may seem natural to
conclude that memory may be more active during
sleep than in the waking state. Dreams are largely
made up of the traces of sensations left upon the
neuro-cerebral organism, and as so eminent an
investigator as Helmholtz has pointed out (as well
as Brentano), these traces may offer characters and
details which are not perceived during actual obser-
vation of the real object. Thus when the accumu-
lated traces of old experience are stirred up within
us during sleep, it is possible that there should come
to light many details which in the waking state we
had forgotten or even never consciously knew.

This is not, however, a real heightening of memory.
During sleep the voluntary concentration of attention
is impossible. Thus the held of sleeping conscious-
ness is invaded by a flood of images and associations
which are artificially eliminated during the day by
the application of limited and too assiduous attention.
As a result of this greater liberty of psychic life
during sleep we are able to recall many facts and
details which wholly escape us when awake. The
phenomenon depends, not on a greater activity of
memory, but on altogether secondary conditions.

It is thus that most so-called “prophetic” dreams
may be explained. There are others which require
a somewhat different explanation. We may, for
instance, dream that such and such a person has
made a request of us which seems to be wholly

are two alternatives : either the existence of the door was mysteriously
revealed in the dream ; or the lady had seen the door and then for-
gotten its existence. Although Mr. Greenwood uncritically adopts the
former alternative, any one who is acquainted with the frequency of such
delusions of memory will know that the second alternative is infinitely
more probable.

SLEEP.

326

unexpected, but which subsequently is actually made.
In such a case it is probable that we already possess
the data which would make the request probable,
but that we had not in waking consciousness fully
realised them or put them together; it was left to
the chance associations of dreaming life.

Thus in the psychic life of sleep we are brought
into a vaguer and larger world than we are conscious
of during waking life, the world of our once-forgotten
past, and the world, it may be also, of the forgotten
past of the race. It is in that perhaps that the
charm of dreams largely lies. In the hereditary
transmission of the characters of the physical and
psychic organism— the continuity of the germ-plasm
as Weismann calls it, or the ideoplasm as Nageli
terms it — nothing is lost. The forms which thought
takes are organic and transmitted by heredity. Even
characteristic gestures, special and peculiar traits, the
characteristics of the handwriting, of thought itself.

are transmitted from one generation to another.
They are certainly transmitted unconsciously. But we
may perhaps dare to glance into a dim future when
consciousness will have so vastly developed that it
may reach back to embrace all that our ancestors
felt and lived and have handed on to us as an organic
patrimony. The men of science of that day will be
called upon to investigate, not only the continuity of
the germ-plasm, but the great secret of the continuity
of consciousness through innumerable generations
which follow and replace one another to infinity,
bound together by that indestructible consciousness.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

327

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Greenwood, Frederick.— Imagination in Dreams and
their Study, 1894.

Sanctis, Sante de. — I Sogni e il Sonno, 1896 (contains
many bibliographical references); I Sogni nei Delin-
quent!, Archivio di Psichiatria, 1896, fasc. v.-vi. ;
Emozioni e Sogni, Dritter Internationale Congress
{i2,g6) f Ur Psychologic, Munich, 1897, p. 348.

Mourly Vold, j. — Einige Experimente liber Gesichts-

- bilder im Traum, ibidem, p. 355.

Hack Tuke, D. — Art. Dreaming, Dictionary of Psycho-
logical Medicine, 1892.

miujoGRAPiiY. 335

R0I3INS0N, Louis. — What Dreams are made of, NoriJi
American Review, Dec. 1893.

Goblot, E. — Le Souvenir des Reves, Revue Rhilosophique,
Sept. 1896.

Tannery. — Sur I’activit^ de Tesprit dans le Reve, ibidem,
Dec. 1894.

Claviere, J. — La Rapidite' de la Pensee dans le Reve,
ibidem, May 1897.

Dugas. — Le Sommeil et la Cerebration Inconsciente, ibidem,
April 1897.

INDEX

Abercrombie, 323
Adamkewietch, 17
Alexander, 158

Albuminuria and excessive sleep, 159,

^63

Alcoholic insanity and dreaming, 289
et seq.

Altdorfer, 168
Anemia, 82, 162
Animals, sleep in, 60
Anjel, 198
Anstie, 126

Arachnoid plexus and sleep, 41
Atavism in dreams, 189, 272, 292,
317 seq.

Attention, fatigue of, 58
Attention during sleep, 37, 112 ct
seq., 325 . .

Auditory subjective phenomena, 248;

in dreams, 254, 257, 259
Automatism, 109
Awakenings, distressed, 186
Awakenings, half, 195 et seq.

Awaking at fixed hour, 35 et seq.
Azam, 133, 143

Baillarger, 196
Bain, 125
Ball, 157

Baths in insomnia, 167
Beard, 83
Becker, 1 7

* Bedroom, arrangement of, iqo et seq,
Belmondo, 60
Beneke, 216
Benham, 89
Berillon, 27
Bile during sleep, i6l
Binns, 156, 168
Binz, 49

Blake’s visions, 241

Blandet, 94

Blind, dreams of the, 302 et seq.

Blood during sleep, 19, 83
Blood pressure, 10, 13, 16, l68_
Blumenbach, 42
Bohm, L., 58
Boerhaave, 116
Borner, 27
Botkine, 103, 294
Bouchard, 10, 49
Bouchut, 79, 83
Bowditch, 25
- Brach, 287
Bradley, F. II., 264
Brain, 28, 158
Brain, vessels of, 14, 16, 25
Brain action, dual, 13 1 et seq.

Brero, van, 120
Bridgman, Laura, 305
Broadbent, 168, 170
Broussais, 35
Brown, A. E., 292
Brown, F. W., 291
Bruce, L. C., 131, 139
Bunge, 232
Burdach, 21, 239
Busch, 17
Byford, 20

Calkins, Mary W., 256, 275, 284,

323

Cappie, 42

Cane, F-, 233 000

Carbonic acid and sleep, 8, 48, 17S
Cardiac action during sleep, 10
Carter, Brudenell, 98
Catalepsy, loi, 212
Cerebral anaemia in sleep, 43 et seq.
Cerebration, unconscious, 36
Chemical theories of sleep, 47, 56
Child, C. M., 28, 36

338

INDEX.

Children, sleep in, 59, 107, 126, 153
ei seg,, 174, 182, 188, 207, 216,
220, 240, 31 1
Clark, Andrew, 162
Cleghorn, 34

Cold on sleep, influence of, 81, 82, 95
Colman, W., 235, 248
Colour visions, 244
Consciousness, sleep as the resling-
tinie of, 59

Consumptives, sleep of, 19 1
Convulsions during sleep, 107
Corning, 43
Cousins, Ward, 102
Cowper, 286
Crichton-Brown, 56, 116
Criminals, dreaming in, 308 e( seq.
Cullen, 285
Cuming, 27

Cutaneous subjective phenomena, 251;
in dreams, 263, 291

Darkness, influence of, 172 et sea.,
184, 288

Darwin, E., 164, 250
Deaf-mutes, 92

Death, commonest hour of, 193

Deiteroscopy, 275

Delage, 257

Delaunay, G. , 243

Depth of sleep, 30 et seq.

Despine, 26, 34
Dewar, 172

Diaphragm during sleep, 7
Digestion during sleep, 18
Dipsychia, 129
Disease and sleep, 190
Donders, 16

Double personality, 127 et seq.

Dreams, 254 et seq.

Drew'ry, W. 137

Durham, 16, 18, 42, 43, 46, 80, 83,

123, 157

Duval, Mathias, 52

Electricit^’ in insomnia, S3 ; in
narcolepsy, 106

Ellis, Havelock, 196, 244, 247, 321
Ellis, W. G., 120

Emotions, 253 ; in dreams, 265 et
seq., 310

Epilepsy and sleep, 98, 100, 248

Epileptics, dreams of, 295
Errera, 49

Eye during sleep, 39
Eyelids during sleep, 40
Exner, 41

Falling in dreams, the sensation of
189 ’

Fatigue, 55, 58, 81, us
Fatigue products as cause of sleep,
48

Fear of darkness, 173
Fere, 98, 185, 278, 286, 289
Fick, 60
Fleming, 43
Fleury, Maurice de, 81
Flying in dreams, the sensation of,
189

Food on sleep, influence of, 83, 157,
168

Forbes, C., 97
Forel, 94, 1 17
Franklin, B,, 314
Fraser, 283

Galen, ii
Gabon, 233, 242
Giessler, 256, 315
Gilbert, J. A., 67, 194, 273
Girondeau, 46, 65
Goethe, 5, 242, 275
Goltz, 142
Gowers, 190, 248
Graves, 194
Greely, 172

Greenwood, F. , 241, 319, 324
Griiithuisen, 279
Gustatory dreams, 254, 260

Haidenhain, 123

Hall, Stanley, 173, 188, 189, 304,

317

Hallam, Florence, 251, 257, 262
Haller, 103

Hallucinations, 254, 275
Hammond, 16, 27, 42, 44, 79, 85,
86, 157, 260, 292
Hansen, 252
Hartley, 255
Hauser, Caspar, 62, 284
Headley, 27

Heart disease and sleep, 194

INDEX.

339

Heat on sleep, influence of, 95, 176,
219

lieermann, 302, 322
Heerwagen, 274, 321
Helmholtz, 325
Henle, 233
Heracleitus, 229
Herrick, C. L., 240
Herschel, 243
Heynsius, 47
Hibernation, 94, 107
Hill, Leonard, 16
Hilton, 44

Histological theories of sleep, 50

Hitschmann, 306

Hodge, 50

Howell, 12, 32, S3

Hulst, 137

Humboldt, A. von, 184
Hunter, John, 251

Hypnagogic state, 195 et seq.^ 238
et seq. , 287

Hypnosis and sleep, 122 ei seq,, 214
Hypnotics, action of, 87
Hypnotism, 117
Hyslop, 238

Hysterical, dreams of the, 295
Hysterical somnolence, 127

Idiots, ioi, 115
Incubi, 296

Insanity and dreaming, 283 el seq.
Insomnia, in animals, 63 ; in man,
67, 79 et seq. ; hygiene of, 163
et seq.

Intestines during sleep, 17
Ireland, W. W., loi, 143
Istomanoff, 213
Itard, 92

Jackson, llughlings, S3, no
James, W., 308
Jaslrow, J., 251, 302, 321
Jouffroy, 36, 38
Joy, influence of, 165

Kant, 156, 229, 271
Keyes, 19

Kidneys during sleep, 18

Knee-jerk, 23

Kohlschiitter, 31, 46

Kolk, Schroder van der, 170, 243, 289

Kraepelin, 116
Krauss, 15
Kiilpe, 35

Ladd, 241
Lasegue, 289
Latah, 120
Laurent, 299
Laycock, 317
Le Dantec, 231
Lehmann, 232
Lemoine, 21
Lepine, 52

Leucomaines as cause of sleep, 49
Liebault, 94, 323

Light, influence of, 170 et seq., 1S4

Linnjeus, 156

Ldwenfeld, 127

Lotze, 21

Lombard, 23

Lombroso, 92, 283

Macario, 2, 21, 255, 292, 322
MacCauley, 114
Macfarlane, 173, 17!;, 1S7
Mackenzie, S., 108
Mahomed, 80
Mann, F. W., 292
Marro, 18

Maudsley, 37, loi, 108, 229, 313,
320, 322

Maury, 196, 254, 260, 275, 283, 287

Memory in dreams, 325

Mendel, 18, 100

Mescal intoxication, 244 et seq,

Mesnet, no

Meyer, B., 102

Meynert, 182, 198

Michelson, 31

Miklucho-Maclay, 222

Mitchell, Weir, 44, 86, 1S8, 239, 244,

247.

Monninghofif and Piesbergen, 31, 194
Moivre, 64
Moll, 27, 40, 123

Monotony, 115^/^,?^., 154, 170, 312-
Morbid dreams, 292 et seq,

Moreau (of Tours), 286
Morrison, A., 107
Mosso, 7,' 10, 12, 15, 30, 57, 169
Movement in dreams, 264
Muller, Johannes, 172

340

INDEX.

Multiple personality, 127 et seq.
Muscles during slcejr, voluntary, 26
et seq.

Muscular sensations in dreams, 263
Myxoedema, sleep in, 90

Napoleon, 103
Narcolepsy, 96 et seq.

Narcotics, action of, 87
Nervous system during sleep, 20 et
seq.

Neumann, 60

Neurasthenia and insomnia, 85
Night, influence of, 93. And see
Darkness

Nightmare, 296 et seq.

Night-terrors, 296
Noorden, 161
Notley, 89
Noyes, 23

Old Age, sleep in, 63, 156, 183,
274, 322

Olfactory dreams, 254, 260, 301
Osborne, 41, 178
Osborne, A. E., 133

Paramnesia, 257, 323
Pare, A., 165
Parish, 248
Paroxysmal sleep, 98
Patrick, 67, 194, 273
Patrizi, 15

Pavor nocturnus, 296
Periodicity of sleep, 54
Personality, multiple, 127 et seq.
Pettenkofier, 8
Pfliiger, 48, 56

Plethysmographic studies of sleep, 12
et seq.

Plotke, 39

Position during sleep, 178 et seq.,

243

Potain, 185
Prentiss, 244
Prodromic dreams, 292
Prolonged sleep, see Narcolepsy
Prophetic dreams, 324
Psychic epidemics, 118
Pulse in sleep, 10 et seq., 214
Purkinje, 41, 172

Ramon y Cajal, 53
Rattray, 185

Reflexes in sleep, 15, 22 et seq., 29,
141

Regnault, 8
Rehlmann, 39
Reiset, 8
Renaudin, 79

Respiration during sleep, 7 et seq.,

215

Retinal vessels in sleep, 83 ; in de-
lirium treme7is, 290
Revelation in dreams, 324
Ribot, 262

Richardson, B. W., 190
Richet, 109
Rivers, W. H. R. , 116
Rockwell, 83
Rosenbach, 24
Riickardt, 50

Sanctis, Sante de, 56, 266, 290,
296, 309
Sander, 39
Sanford, 256
Santorini, 178
Schaber, 103
Schleyer, 314
Schmidt- Rimpler, 2S8
Schopenhauer, 173, 252
Semelaigne, 105
Sergnejeff, 301

Sexual difference in reference to sleep,
8, 19, 126, 207, 309, 321
Sexual emotion in dreams, 269
Sgrosso, 4
Shaw, Claye, 90
Sidgwick, H., 252
Simon, Max, 126, 25S, 262
Sleepers, see Narcolepsy
Smell, dreams of, see Olfactory dreams
Smith, Eustace, 81
Snakes, visions of, 290
Sollier, 128
Soltmann, 154
Sommer, 47

Somnambulism, 28, 38, 1 10 ct seq.,
124 et seq.

Somnolence, see Narcolepsy
Spinal cord in sleep, 16, 26, 29
Spitta, 284
Ssikorski, 118’

INDEX.

341

Starting in sleep, 186
Starvation and sleep, 93
Stomach during sleep, 17
Strumpell, 91, 279
Struve, 64

Suggestion, 4, 38, 119, 215
Sully, J., 173. 315
Summer-sleep, 94
Supernatural dreams, 324
Sweat glands during sleep, 17

TAT.king, in sleep, 27, 34; in dreams,
274, 285

Tarchanoff, 14, 25, 29, 42, 43, 45,
154, 248

Taste dreams, see Gustatory dreams
Taylor, S., 316

Temperature, during sleep, 9, 10; of
bedroom, 176, 183
Thought-reading, 251
Thudichum, 158

Thyroid gland as organ of sleep, 41
Time to be devoted to sleep, 153 et seq.
Tissi4 137
Titchener, 262
Tr^lat, 288

Tuke, Hack, 38, 39, 126, 293
Tylor, 5

Urine during sleep, 18, 163
Utility of dreams, 31 1

Valentin, 20
Vascular system, 216
Vasomotor action in sleep, 13 seq.
Vasomotor theory of sleep, 42 et seq.,
S3, 56

Verbal dreams, 274, 285
Visceral sensation in dreams, 262
Visual axes during sleep, 39
Visual dreams, 254, 257, 258
Visual phenomena, subjective, 233 et
seq.

Vizioli, 16

Vogel, 19

Vogt, 10 1

Voit, 8, 17S

Void, Hourly, 258, 263

Waller, 25
Wartanoff, 58
Wedensky, 25
Weed, Sarah, 25, 257, 265
Weygandt, 240, 262
Wigan, 138
Will during sleep, 38
Wilson, A., 130
Witte, 92

Wundt, 56, 61, 285

YAVtLMNG, 57

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LIFE OF DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI. By J. Knight
LIFE OF SAMUEL JOHNSON. By Colonel F. Grant.

LIFE OF DARWIN. By G. T. Bettany.

LIFE OF CHARLOTTE BRONTfi. By A. Birrkll.

LIFE OF THOMAS CARLYLE. By R. Garnett, LL.D.

LIFE OF ADAM SMITH. By R. B. Haldane, M.P,

LIFE OF KEATS. By W. M. Rossetti.

LIFE OF SHELLEY. By William Sharp.

LIFE OF SMOLLETT. By David Hannay.

LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. By Austin Dobson.

LIFE OF SCOTT. By Professor Yonge.

LIFE OF BURNS. By Professor Blackie.

LIFE OF VICTOR HUGO. By Frank T. Marzials.

LIFE OF EMERSON. By Richard Garnett, LL.D.

LIFE OF GOETHE. By James Sime.

LIFE OF CONGREVE. By Edmund Gosse.

LIFE OF BUNYAN. By Canon Venables.

LIFE OF CRABBE. By T. E. Kebbel.

LIFE OF HEINE. By William Sharp.

LIFE OF MILL. By W. L. Courtney.

LIFE OF SCHILLER. By Henry W. Nevinson.

LIFE OF CAPTAIN MARRYAT. By David Hannay.

LIFE OF LESSING. By T. W. Rolleston.

LIFE OF MILTON. By R. Garnett, LL.D.

LIFE OF BALZAC. By Frederick Wedmore.

LIFE OF GEORGE ELIOT. By Oscar Browning.

LIFE OF JANE AUSTEN. By Goldwin Smith.

LIFE OF BROWNING. By William Sharp.

LIFE OF BYRON. By Hon. Roden Noel.

LIFE OF HAWTHORNE. By Moncure D. Conway.

LIFE OF SCHOPENHAUER. By Professor Wallace.

LIFE OF SHERIDAN. By Lloyd Sanders.

LIFE OF THACKERAY. By Herman Merivale and Frank T.
Marzials.

LIFE OF CERVANTES. By H. E. Watts,

LIFE OF VOLTAIRE. By Francis Espinasse.

LIFE OF LEIGH HUNT. By Cosmo Monkhouse.

LIFE OF WHITTIER. By W. J Linton.

LIFE OF RENAN. By Francis Espinasse.

LIFE OF THOBEAU. By H. S. Salt.

LIBRARY EDITION OF ‘GREAT WRITERS,’ Demy 8vo, ss. 6d.

I^ONDON ; Walter Scott, Ltd., Paternoster Square.

Ibsen’s Prose Dramas

Edited by WILLIAM ARCHER

Complete in Five Vols, Crown 8vo, Clothe Price 3X. 6d. each.
Set of Five Voh.y in Case, ijs. 6d. ; in Half Morocco,
in Case, 32r. 6d.

• iVe seem at last to be shown men and women as they are ; and at first
it is more than we can endure. ... All Ibsens characters speak and act
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to reveal themselves. There never was such a mirror held up to nature
before; it is too terrible. . . . Yet we must return to Ibsen, with his
remorseless surgery, his remorseless electric-light, until we, too, have
grown strong and learned to face the naked— if necessary, the flayed and
bleeding— reality.’ — Speaker (London).

VoL. I. ‘A DOLUS HOUSE/ ‘THE LEAGUE
OF YOUTH,’ and *THE PILLARS OF SOCIETY.’
With Portrait of the Author, and Biographical Introduc-
tion by William Archer.

VoL. II. ‘GHOSTS/ ‘AN ENEMY OF THE
PEOPLE,’ and ‘THE WILD DUCK.’ With an Intro-
ductory Note.

VoL. III. ‘LADY INGER OF OSTRAT,’ ‘THE
VIKINGS AT PIELGELAND,’ ‘THE PRETEND-
ERS.’ With an Introductory Note and Portrait of Ibsen.

VoL. IV. ‘EMPEROR AND GALILEAN.’ With
an Introductory Note by William Archer.

VoL. V. ‘ROSMERSHOLM/ ‘THE LADY
FROM THE SEA,’ ‘HEDDA GABLER.’ Translated
by William Archer. With an Introductory Note.

The sequence of the plays in eecch volume is chronological ; the complete
set of volumes comprising the dramas presents them in chronological order.

LONDON : Walter Scott, Ltd., Paternoster Square.

Library of Humour

Cloth Elegant^ Large Crown Sw, Price 3J. 6tf. per Vol.

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VOLUMES ALREADY ISSUED.

THE HUMOUR OF FRANCE. Translated, with an
Introduction' and Notes, by Elizabeth Lee. With
numerous Illustrations by Paul Fri^nzeny.

THE HUMOUR OF GERMANY. Translated, with
an Introduction and Notes, by Hans Muller-Casenov.
With numerous Illustrations by C. E. Brock.

THE HUMOUR OF ITALY. Translated, with an
Introduction and Notes, by A. Werner. With 50 Illus-
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THE HUMOUR OF AMERICA. Selected with a
copious Biographical Index of American Humorists, by
James Barr.

THE HUMOUR OF HOLLAND. Translated, with
an Introduction and Notes, by A. Werner. With
numerous Illustrations by Dudley Hardy.

THE HUMOUR OF IRELAND. Selected by D. J.
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Paque.

THE HUMOUR OF SPAIN. Translated, with an
Introduction and Notes, by Susette M. Taylor. With
numerous Illustrations by H. R. Millar.

THE HUMOUR OF RUSSIA. Translated, with
Notes, by E. L. Boole, and an Introduction by Stepniak.
With 50 Illustrations by Paul FrBnzeny.

THE HUMOUR OF JAPAN. Translated, with an
Introduction by A. M. With Illustrations by George
Bigot (from drawings made in Japan). [/« preparation.

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The contents of these little handbooks are so arranged as to
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The Secret cf a Clear Head.

Common Mind Troubles.

The Secret of a Good Memory.

The Heart and its Function.

Personal Appearances in Health and Disease.
The House and its Surroundings.

Alcohol: Its Use and Abuse.

Exercise and Training.

Baths and Bathing. '

Health in Schools.

The Skin and its Troubles.

How to make the Best of Life.

Nerves and Nerve-Troubles.

The Sight, and How to Preserve it.

Premature Death : Its Promotion and Prevention.
Change, as a Mental Restorative.

Youth: Its Care and Culture.

The Gentle Art of Nursing the Sick.

The Care of Infants and Young Children.
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Every-day Ailments, and How to Treat Them.
How to do Business. A Guitle to Success in Life.

Howto Behave. Manual of Etiquette and Personal Habits.
How to Write. A Manual of Composition and Letter Writing.
How to Debate. With Hints on Public Speaking,

Don’t : Directions for avoiding Common Errors of Speech.

The Parental Don’t: Warnings to Parents.

Why Smoke and Drink. By James Parton.

Elocution. By T. R. W. Pearson, M. A., of St., Catharine’s College,
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VOLUxMES ALREADY ISSUED—

1 ROMANCE OF KING ARTHUR

2 TIIOREAU’S WALDEN,
a TUOREAU’S “ WEEK.”

4 THOREAU’S ESSAYS.

5 ENGLISH OPIUM-EATER.

6 LANDOR’S CONVERSATIONS.

7 PLUTARCH’S LIVES.

8 RELIGIO MEDICI, &c.

9 SHELLEY’S LETTERS.

10 PROSE WRITINGS OP SWIFT.

11 MY STUDY WINDOWS.

12 'I'HE ENGLISH POETS.

13 THE BIGLOW PAPERS.

14 GREAT ENGLISPI PAINTERS.

15 LORD BYRON’S LETTERS.

16 ESSAYS BY LEIGH HUNT.

17 LONGFELLOW’S PROSE.

18 GREAT MUSICAL COMPOSERS.

19 MARCUS AURELIUS.

20 TEACHING OP EPIC'TETUS.

21 SENECA’S MORALS.

22 SPECIMEN DAYS IN AMERICA.

23 DEMOCRATIC VISTAS.

24 WHITE’S SELBORNE.

25 DEFOE’S SINGLETON.

26 MAZZINI’S ESSAYS.

27 PROSE WRITINGS OF HEINK

28 REYNOLDS’ DISCOURSES.

29 PAPERS OF STEELE AND

ADDISON.

30 BURNS’S LETTERS.

31 VOLSUNGA SAGA.

32 SARTOR RESARTUS.

33 WRITINGS OF EMERSON.

34 LIFE OF LORD HERBERT.

35 ENGLISH PROSE.

36 IBSEN’S PILLARS OF SOCIETY.

37 IRISH FAIRY AND FOLK TALES.

38 ESSAYS OF DR. JOHNSON.

39 ESSAYS OF WILLIAM HAZLITT.

40 LANDOR’S PENTAMERON, &c.

41 POE’S TALES AND ESSAYS.

42 VICAR OF WAKEFIELD.

43 POLITICAL ORATIONS.

44 AUTOCRAT OF THE BREAK-

FAST-TABLE.

45 POET AT THE BREAKFAST-

TABLE.

4(5 PROFESSOR AT THE BREAK-
FAST-TABLE.

47 CHESTERFIELD’S LETTERS.

48 STORI'ES FROM CARLETON.

49 JANE EYRE.

50 ELIZABETHAN E.VGLAND.

51 WRITINGS OF THOMAS DAVIS

52 SPENCE’S ANECDOTES.

53 MORE’S UTOPIA.

54 SADPS GULISTAN.

55 ENGLISH FAIliY TALES.

56 NORTHERN STUDIES.

57 FAMOUS REV1EW.S.

58 ARISTOTLE’S ETHICS.

59 PERICLES AND ASP ASIA.

60 ANNALS OF TACITUS.

61 ESSAYS OF ELLL

62 BALZAC.

63 DE MUSSET’S COMEDIES.

64 CORAL REEFS.

65 SHERIDAN’S PLAYS.

66 OUR VILLAGE.

67 MASTER HUMPHREY’S CLOCK

68 TALES FROM WONDERLAND.

69 JERROLD’S ESSAYS.

70 THE RIGHTS OF WOMAN.

71 “THE ATHENIAN ORACLE.”

72 ESSAYS OF SAINTE-BEUVE.

73 SELECTIONS FROM PLATO.

74 HEINE’S TRAVEL SKETCHES.

75 MAID OF ORLEANS.

76 SYDNEY SMITH.

77 THE NEW SPIRIT.

78 MALORY’S BOOK OF MAR-

VELLOUS ADVENTURES.

79 HELPS’ ESSAYS & APHORISMS.

80 ESSAYS OF MONTAIGNE.

81 Thackeray’s BARRY LYNDON.

82 SCHILLER’S WILLIAM TELL.

83 CARLYLE’S GERMAN ESSAYS.

84 LAMBS ESSAYS.

85 WORDSWORTH’S PROSE.

86 LEOPARDI’S DIALOGUES.

87 THE INSPECTOR-GENERAL.

88 BACON’S ESSAYS.

89 PROSE OF MILTON.

90 PLATO'S REPUBLIC.

91 PASSAGES FROM FROISSART.

92 PROSE OF COLERIDGE.

93 HEINE IN ART AND LETTERS.

94 ESSAYS OF DE QUINCEY.

95 LIVES OF ITALIAN PAINTERS.

96 LESSING’S LAOCOON.

97 PLAYS OF MAETERLINCK.

98 WALTON’S COMPLETE ANGLER,

99 LESSING’S NATHAN THE WISE.

100 STUDIES BY. RENAN.

101 MAXIMS OF GOETHE.

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With a lengthy Introduction dealing with “ The Need for an Endowed
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Copies may still be had, uniform with the above, of

THE THEATRICAL WORLD OF 1893, with an Epistle Dedi-
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the theatrical WORLD OF 1894. By William Archer.
With an Introduction by George Bernard Shaw, and a Synopsis of
Playbills of the year by Henry George Hibbert.

THE theatrical WORLD OF 1895. By William Archer.
With a Prefatory Letter by Arthur W. Pinero, and a Synopsis of
Playbills of the year by Henry George Hibbert.

LONDON; Walter Scott, Ltd., Paternoster Square,

THE CANTERBURY POETS.

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1 CHRISTIAN YEAR

2 COLERIDGE

3 LONGFELLOW

4 CAMPBELL

5 SHELLEY

6 WORDSWORTH

7 BLAKE

8 WITITTIER

9 POE

10 CHATTERTON

11 BURNS. Songs

12 BURNS. Poems

13 MARLOWE

14 KEATS

15 HERBERT

16 HUGO

17 COWPER

18 SHAKESPEARE’S POEMS, etc.

19 EMERSON

20 SONNETS OF THIS CENTURY

21 WHITMAN

22 SCOTT. Lady of the Lake, etc.

23 SCOTT. Marmion, etc.

24 PRAED

25 HOGG

26 GOLDSMITH

27 LOVE LETTERS, etc.

28 SPENSER

29 CHILDREN OF TFIE POETS

30 JONSON

31 BYRON. Miscellaneous.

32 BYRON. Don Juan.

33 THE SONNETS OF EUROPE

34 RAMSAY

35 DOBELL

36 POPE

37 HEINE

38 BEAUMONT ,& FLETCHER

39 BOWLES, LAMB, etc.

40 SEA MUSIC

41 EARLY ENGLISH POETRY

42 HERRICK

43 BALLADES AND RONDEAUS

44 IRISH MINSTRELSY

45 MILTON’S PARADISE LOST

46 JACOBITE BALLADS

47 DAYS OF TPIE YEAR

48 AUSTRALIAN BALLADS

49 MOORE

50 BORDER BALLADS

51 SONG-TIDE

52 ODES OF HOR.\CE

53 OSSIAN

54 FAIRY MUSIC

55 SOUTHEY

56 CHAUCER

57 GOLDEN TREASURY

58 POEMS OF WILD LIFE

59 PARADISE REGAINED

60 CRABBE

61 DORA GREEN WELL

62 FAUST

63 AMERICAN SONNETS

64 LANDOR’S POEMS

65 GREEK ANTHOLOGY

66 HUNT AND HOOD

67 HUMOROUS POEMS

68 LYTTON’S PLAYS

69 GREAT ODES

70 MEREDITH’S POEMS

71 IMITATION OF CHRIST

72 UNCLE TOBY BIRTHDAY BK

73 PAINTER-POETS

74 WOMEN POETS

75 LOVE LYRICS

76 American Humorous Ver.se.

77 MINOR SCOTCH LYRICS

78 CAVALIER LYRISTS

79 GERMAN BALLADS

80 SONGS OF BERANGER

81 RODEN NOEL’S POEMS

82 SONGS OF FREEDOM

83 CANADIAN POEMS

84 Contemporary ScottishVerse

85 POEMS OF NATURE.

86 CRADLE SONGS.

87 BALLADS OF SPORT.

88 MATTHEW ARNOLD.

59 CLOUGH’S BOTHIE.
p BROWNING’S POEMS.

Pippa Passes, etc. Vol. 1.
BROWNING’S POEMS.

A Bint in the ’Scutcheon, etc.

)2 BROWNING’S POEMS.

Dramatic Lyrics. Vol. 3.

)3 MACKAY’S LOVER’S MISSAl
PIENRY KIRKE WHITE.

Vol. 2

London: Walter Scott, Limited, Paternoster Square.

The Canterbury Poets.

IMPORTANT ADDITIONS.

WORKS BY ROBERT BROWNING.

VOL. I.

Pippa Passes, and other Poetic Dramas,

by Robert Browning. With an Introductory Note
by Frank Kinder.

VOL. II.

A Blot in the ’Scutcheon, and other

Poetic Dramas, by Robert Browning. With an Intro-
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